Chuck

Spore

Here’s a thirty-five minute long video of Will Wright’s presentation of Spore at the Computer Game Developers’ Conference. Whoever wrote the description is right; it does look like it’s going to be the best videogame ever made. (If you don’t want to or can’t watch the video, GameSpy did a write-up of it). And here’s another longer video of the entire presentation.

Pretty much every time I’ve seen a demo of the game, I’ve been hugely impressed. But what impresses me the most about this demo, even more than how amazing the game looks, is the philosophy behind it. Not just the stated premise — you can have a game that allows infinite content without an infinite budget — but the philosophy of pushing the limits of what games can do and what games are about. From what I’ve seen, the game delivers on what it promises, and each component of it (for example, making an arbitrarily-designed creature learn how to walk) is impressive on its own. And that could end up as either a shallow tech demo with a slick front end, or a traditional RTS or Sims type game with some new features tacked on.

Instead, you get the impression that the philosophy is to do whatever it takes to make the core idea (a simulation of life from the cellular level to the galactic level) work, instead of cutting corners and doing traditional stuff and taking the easy way out.

And even more impressive, doing all that without being so damn arrogant. Wright acknowledges influences wherever they come from, and every time I’ve seen him talk, I never get the impression that he sets his games off as superior to other games. They just end up, more often than not, being that way. It’s really nice to see a guy and his team and his project getting attention based on merit instead of hype.

Now I just really, really want to play the thing. I’m not so arrogant to assume that I could’ve gotten a spot on the project if I’d tried — at Maxis, especially after the move to Redwood Shores, people talked about Spore like the people in Logan’s Run talked about Sanctuary. But I did have a few people ask if I were interested, and my take was that I didn’t have anything useful to contribute to the project, so I shouldn’t even attempt to get on it. After seeing the video, I have to say I’m glad I’m not working on it, so I can just enjoy it when it comes out.

But maybe, after this Disney job ends, I can try to weasel my way onto the expansion packs or the sequel… Anybody got any contacts for me?

No Peace, Los Angeles

Now I can really appreciate the plight of Chinese people barred from the internet, as I too have gone a week without access to my own website and e-mail. Including three days with no internet access at all!

No need to call Amnesty International just yet; my hotel in Burbank just refused to connect to my web host, and the cheap motel in Anaheim didn’t even have a phone, much less an internet connection. My living conditions definitely fluctuate based on whether a giant, multinational entertainment company is fitting the bill or I am. I suppose it says something about me that I considered a motel room with no internet and only three cable stations “roughing it.”

Considering how much I went over budget with this little trip, I sure found my cheapskate instincts taking over — the hotel was charging seven bucks for a can of shaving cream, and I wasn’t having any of that. Better to go into work looking slovenly than pay that much for soap. Or food; the rain was coming down so hard the first night there that I couldn’t practically go out to eat, and I wasn’t going to eat at the hotel’s ridiculously overpriced restaurant, so I had a dinner of Pocky and a Whatchmacallit bar. But since I was at either Universal or Disneyland the entire time, I was forgoing the basics (balking at the costs as if I’d grown up during the Depression) but still paying theme park prices for dinner.

In any case, I’m back now, and I may be able to get a good story or two out of the week. For now, I’m in the first stages of a chest cold, so I’m tired and achey and I feel like Tom Waits after a tonsilectomy. (The fact that smoking inside my hotel room is such a novelty that I abuse it every time I stay in a hotel probably didn’t help). So I’m going to sleep. In my own bed.

Head Trauma

I’ve had the worst headache since early this morning. I’ve heard enough horror stories from people who have real migraines to know that I don’t have that, but that’s fine with me because what I do have is plenty.

It was bad enough to keep waking me up and then immediately make me want to go back to sleep. Which I did, several times. I’ve been sick to my stomach all day, it’s been near-impossible to concentrate on anything, and off-and-on it’s been hard to visually focus on anything. All taking a pill does is degrade it to a dull throbbing pain for an hour or two. Complaining about it helps, though.

Speaking of complaining: I’ve got to spend another whole week in LA. I’m still not a fan, but my trips down there have been relatively productive recently, so I guess it’s a necessary evil. But my easy travel karma has expired, apparently, because for this trip I’ve got to fly through LAX instead of Burbank. I’ve only been in that airport once, when I missed my flight back to SFO from London and had to re-route there instead. The airport itself isn’t so bad, it’s just not as small and convenient as Burbank’s is. And of course, the drive from LAX to Glendale is a stone drag.

Because I haven’t made use of my Annual Pass and it’s going to expire before too long, I arranged to spend an extra day down there and go to Disneyland. It’s definitely not as much fun when you go by yourself, and there’s not much new going on, although I see the Monsters, Inc. ride is now up and running. And when I’m paying for my own hotel & rental car, instead of working it into an existing business trip, the accomodations go down a couple of stars. Still, it’s Disneyland, and it’s something different to do, and I do want to see the Pirates of the Caribbean one last time before they change it to fit the movie.

Lousy Runs Both Ways

Every time I’ve tried to see Alison Krauss and Union Station in concert, the tickets have been sold out long before I even heard they were going to be in town. One time I even considered driving down to some God-forsaken town in central CA to see them because the Bay Area shows were sold out.

So (duh) I signed up for their online mailing list. I got my first mailing in my inbox today, and they’re coming to the Nob Hill Masonic Center on March 11th! I immediately tried to get tickets online, and all that’s available are two seats way in the back of the far side of the balcony, which, including tickets.com’s bend-over fee, would come to $120! Single seats are easier to get; if I went stag I could sit way back at floor level for just under 70 bucks.

I’m convinced there’s something unsavory going on here. There’s got to be some consortium somewhere buying up tickets in bulk to scalp them. Or some secret concert-announcement service that I’m not aware of. Or the band has a huge fan following and they just won a bunch of Grammy awards and they’re playing in a big city and I missed out because I didn’t get up until 10 and didn’t log in until 11 this morning.

Anyway, the mailing list also linked to this mash-up of “I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow” with “Hollaback Girl.” I can’t say I like it, but I’m baffled and intrigued by it. Something Awful got it right when they said that in a better world, “Hollaback Girl” would’ve been the stupidest song of last year if not for the tragedy that was “My Humps”. And the beat doesn’t quite match up, either. But still, I can’t stop listening to it.

Checklist

One of the consequences of having a spastic attention span is that I’ve got a huge mental to-do list that grows faster than is possible for a mortal human — even one with my considerable gifts as granted me by your yellow Earth sun — to check them off.

And because it’s all in me head, it’s completely unsorted and un-prioritized, so stuff like “do laundry” is right there mixed in with “write a Flash prototype for that card game you want to do” and “make quarterly tax payment” is right below “watch the season premiere of ’24′” and “learn Japanese” and “get medical insurance” are somehow getting exactly the same level of procrastination. Which really doesn’t make sense, and is making me into more of a flake than I ever intended: “Sorry, I would’ve shown up for surgery to give you my kidney, but I’ve been meaning to finish reading this issue of Batman for months now.”

I keep seeing links to online and offline organizers and to-do lists, but have yet to find one that even closely approximates how my brain works. Err, “works.” I need to be able to add entries quickly, the second I think of them, attach notes or whatever other information I need to get it done, reorganize it and assign/change priorities so easily that “organize the To-Do list” doesn’t become another item, and give a real sense of accomplishment once I’ve checked one off. And maybe give me a cookie.

I could write my own, but I hope I don’t have to point out the problem there.

Still, even though technology hasn’t yet caught up with my brainspasm method of neural functioning, I have managed to make some minor headway. I’m assuming nobody reading this cares all that much about Java reflection and persistent object databases, so I’ll leave that stuff out. Even though it’s kind of cool, and isn’t so over-engineered as to be useless.

Finished Shadow of the Colossus
And I’m going to have to recant my earlier reviews of it — interesting concept and presentation and great visuals, but it’s not a good videogame. It feels too gamey, and it’s not a good game; it’s a frustrating game that you only keep playing because the concept is interesting. Sure, the conclusion is satisfying as an interactive movie, but I decided halfway through the last level that there was nothing they could show or do that’d be worth the frustration of beating the final boss.

Watched The Aristocrats
I’d expected it to be more interesting than funny, but it turned out more funny than interesting. The whole “joke as jazz performance” idea isn’t strong enough to carry a feature-length movie, and I’m not really buying it since very few people actually tell the joke. But pretty much all the people they interview came out of it seeming pretty cool and funny, even the ones I don’t usually like. The only ones who still seem irredemably creepy and annoying are Taylor Negron and Andy Dick. And that sleazy guy in the jacuzzi. And the bad ventriloquist.

Updated the website
Not really, but I did finally clue in and add a link to Fingerbutter.com. And that’s interesting either as a comment on the anonymity of the internet or on how dense I am. A while ago I saw via technorati that some new site was linking to mine, and so I checked it out to make sure they didn’t have any of my tasteful but misguided erotic photos on there. It wasn’t until last night that I actually made the connection that it was my friend Joe’s website. Even though his name is on the posts, he links to our mutual work friends, and he mentions stuff I should’ve recognized, I’d just been thinking, “hey, that’s nice and a little odd that some stranger is linking to my website.” I went back through and re-read it all hearing Joe tell it, and it makes sense now. So the lesson is either that Joe needs to add an “about” page, or I need to rethink my life dream of becoming a private investigator, or some combination of the two.

So that’s four down (I also finally saw Conan the Barbarian over the weekend), about a billion to go. Now I’ve got to go buy replacement ink cartridges for my printer, which had been hovering on the list between “write a novel” and “reconnect with friends I’ve been neglecting for way too long,” but just shot up in importance because of “do taxes.”

News from the Bunker

Making my own kind of music Okay, my sleep disorder thing has gone from being quirky irresponsibility to being really, really, really annoying. What set off the latest round was my decision at around 10pm the other night to rewrite what I’d been doing for work. And all the problems from that kept me up to the wee hours. It only takes a little bit to upset the balance, which means I’ve been up past 6am the past couple days, sleeping into the late afternoon, and feeling generally creepy and disconnected.

I wasted a big chunk of time this afternoon writing a post on SFist about that congressional hearing on internet business in China. I first read the transcript of the hearing around 8 this morning, and it got me filled with righteous indignation that lasted until I fell asleep. By the time I woke up, I felt obliged to write something about it even though I don’t care that much about it anymore.

Now I’ve finally got my work back to a functional state, I can finish adding the stuff I need to add, hopefully without introducing a whole nother mess of problems. What sucks is that I’ve only got myself to blame; I’m not over-worked by any stretch of the imagination, and I have a perfectly reasonable set of things to have accomplished. It’s because of my poor time-management and tendency to over-engineer everything that’s got me to this state.

Now it’s up to Tylenol PM to get me out of this state. And as I slip off into pharmaceutically induced slumber, I can dream of a world in which I go into work, have a list of things to do, and finish them without my ADD kicking in or my usual tendency to over-complicate everything. And I fly the Millennium Falcon.

180 on the 360

Blurry Klingon Another inconsequential post on SFist, this time about the rumored video iPod with a bigger screen that, like me, is touch sensitive.

And still I can’t work up much of a reaction other than “meh.” Either I’m getting more mature (plastic guitars notwithstanding) or I’ve just reached consumer electronics saturation what with all the handheld videogame players and MP3 players and phones and such. They don’t seem all that impressive anymore. Now, when they come out with one that plays video and more MP3s than will fit on a memory stick and gives directions and keeps notes and works as a phone, then get back to me. That’s what I’m missing from the Treo — it was kind of a lousy phone, but I liked always having access to maps and a notepad.

In other news, the Microsoft guy is saying that the Xbox 360 shortage is coming to an end within the next “four to six weeks,” and they’ll be readily available. Much to the dismay of ebay price-gougers. And me, since the news (along with the speculation that the PS3 won’t be out until September) re-sparked my interest in the damn thing. I still don’t play console games that often anymore (plastic guitars notwithstanding) and nothing’s really changed to make me want one. I can only guess it’s a subconscious reaction to a story I read a couple of days ago about this group of rabid recyclers who were pledging to buy nothing new in 2006 except for food and medical necessities. The thought of going a whole year without buying things I don’t need fills me with horror and dread.

Which reminds me: what I do need is a new camera. I’ve been to four conventions and other indoor-type events now, and half the pictures I get are worthless because they’re too dark and/or blurry. Either this camera sucks, or I’m developing Parkinsons Disease. Even the ones I take in daylight come out either too grainy or the colors are a lot more muted than I’d like to see. I realize that there are ISO and shutter-speed settings I could use to account for it, but my last camera (same Sony Cybershot line, just lower resolution) worked perfectly as a point-and-click. It was hard to take a bad picture with that one, and it was smaller and a lot more convenient.

If anybody has digital camera recommendations, I’d like to hear them.

Eat Well

Toast, Break, and Eat I was all excited at the prospect of Lego Eggo Waffles — how could any sane person not be — but in reality, they’re kind of disappointing. It’s as if they were so proud of coming up with the idea (even though pretty much every kid in America came up with the idea years ago) that they didn’t follow through on the execution.

They’re not very construction-worthy. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say they’re not any more suitable for building things than traditional waffles.

I’ll admit that I was hungry, and therefore didn’t really attempt any project more sophisticated than stacking two of them on top of each other and then eating them. So it’s possible that my hunger was distracting me from the educational fun potential of these things. But for now I’ll just voice my disappointment that these are nothing more than waffles with bumps on the top. It’s almost as if it’s nothing more than some cheap marketing gimmick.

I still want to try combining them with my Lego Mindstorms kit to make a Wafflebot, but only after I’ve figured out how to hook up a voice box to it. You can’t have a Wafflebot without its shambling up to people and pleading “Kill… me…”

Speaking of wrath-filled mechanical hybrid monsters, I wrote a review of Yokai Daisenso for SFist yesterday. Short version: it was pretty cool, but not mind-blowing. More of a lightweight comedy than anything else. And just in time, the Obakemono project added an entry for the Azukiarai that featured prominently in the movie.

Guitar Background Character

You, sir, are my nemesis I finally broke down and spent my gift certificate on a copy of Guitar Hero. What got me was Matt’s reminding me on here that it contains “More Than a Feeling” (as made famous by Boston), and this video of a guy playing on expert.

It really does deserve the hype it’s been getting; it’s awesome. Best things about the game, in order of awesomeness:

They didn’t make it as much a guitar simulator as an air guitar simulator. It’s not about really learning to play guitar, it’s about the rock.
It’s got a tilt sensor, so to enter star power mode you turn the guitar up on end. Rock.
The difficulty progression is really well thought out. I went through the tutorial, played a few of the songs on easy level, and I was getting over 90% on each one. So I figured I could advance up to medium difficulty and all of a sudden it was throwing weird colors and solos and chords at me. I went back to easy and worked my way back up, and it’s a lot more rewarding than failing repeatedly.
They didn’t have to put in a whammy bar, but they did anyway. Rock.
All the covers are really well done; many of them I can’t distinguish from the originals.
Supposedly, they really have hammer-down and pull-off moves, although I have yet to be able to pull one off. Rock?

So far the best I’ve done is 99% accuracy and a 332-note streak on “More Than a Feeling” at medium difficulty. And the thing is: just playing a cover version of it, pressing colored versions on a little plastic guitar, standing in front of a TV in my living room, naked, with little pixelated people clapping along, is so freakin’ awesome, that I can’t imagine how the real guy from Boston, playing the real song on stage in front of hundreds of real people, didn’t just explode from the sheer 70s Rock Majesty of it all.

Speaking of exploding, I saw on iTunes that N Sync did a mostly a cappella Boyz II Men style cover of “More Than a Feeling” on their first “album.” It’s almost Lovecraftian — you know in your rational mind that it’s horrible, but you can’t really understand how horrible it truly is until you experience it for yourself.

At the moment, my most hated song is “Crossroads” by Cream. It’s not just that I can’t play it; it’s that I can’t understand how anyone can play it. And this is on easy difficulty. I’m guessing Clapton had a little bit more practice than I have, or else the big colored buttons make it more difficult. Or the makers of the game have a cruel streak, which is why they didn’t use “Sunshine of Your Love” or “White Room” instead. Also, including “Killer Queen” is a little sadistic, because it’s such a goofy and cheesy song and that just adds to the humiliation as you’re reminded you’re no Brian May.

The Gamespot review was right in that the game needs some Van Halen. Some Led Zeppelin would’ve been cool as well. I’m hoping there’s going to be a sequel that uses the same controller.

Also, I don’t really play the game naked, I’m just wondering if people really read these things when I start talking about videogames.

George Bush Doesn’t Care About Black Puppets

It was pretty asinine how Fox ran all four final episodes of “Arrested Development” in one night, on a Friday when nobody watches TV, and how they kept showing commercials for sitcoms they weren’t cancelling, and how they all looked really stupid and pandering.

It doesn’t really matter, though, because I got to see all four episodes, and they blew me.

Away. I keep forgetting to say “away.” All four of them were awesome, and it was about as perfect a series finale as you’re ever going to get from television. Even if they don’t end up continuing the series on Showtime, it’s okay, because it ended so well. It was funny, and juvenile, and topical, and self-referential, but it also tied everything together brilliantly — the kind of plot twist on top of another plot twist on top of a reference to something that happened two seasons ago on top of an adolescent sex joke that only they can pull off.

My favorite bits that I can remember: the Hung Jury, Maeby’s birth announcement, having to bleep out the mention of “Veronica Mars,” the guy visiting Buster in a coma, Ann-yong’s real name, the cabinets without enough set decoration, Buster’s directions to the cab drivers, the names of the Iraqi streets, every time Ron Howard said “oh my,” and pretty much every time Ron Howard said anything.

The only way it could’ve been more perfect is if they’d been able to get not just Judge Reinhold and Bud Cort, but Jude Law.

The Day the Wonder Died

I’d been concentrating on the heartwarmingly awkward and comedic side of the WonderCon, and I’d forgotten one basic fact: when you get thousands of socially inept people in a building together, it can really get annoying.

We went to see JJ Abrams’ talk about Mission Impossible 3 and he came across as just a good guy: genuinely enthusiastic about his work and about being at the convention, genuinely nice to the fans, neither too self-deprecating nor too arrogant, and showing a career-healthy level of reverence for Tom Cruise. The people all around us, however, were there to see Kevin Smith, who was coming up next. So they talked all through the panel, in their normal, irritating conversational volume.

I’d planned to stick around for Kevin Smith, but I was so annoyed by his followers that I went with Jessica and Jeff to see the panel with TV Creature Feature hosts. And got the same behavior from the people who wandered in waiting to see Grant Morrison. Is it really that hard to just show a little common courtesy?

And when you can get pretty much the entire group interested in what’s happening on stage, like with the Bryan Singer panel about Superman Returns, you get the flip side of rude loud-talkers — the cringingly uncomfortable Q&A session. One of the people was almost hyper-ventilating and couldn’t ask his question. Another criticized the costume. Another mentioned the rumors that Singer had molested young boys in a hotel room. And part of me wants to know what the guy in the banana costume was going to ask, but then the rest of me hates that part of me.

I forget which panel it was — either Bryan Singer or JJ Abrams — but somebody fawned for a minute or so and then asked if he could give them his business card. He got booed by the crowd, and he deserved it.

On the show floor itself, there wasn’t a lot that grabbed my attention. I’d been looking for some recent issues, and everyone was selling silver-age and golden-age stuff. Or crap. Or silver-age and golden-age crap. Some combination of all of those. One of the vendors had all their trade paperbacks discounted, so I picked up a Sandman collection (I’d bought all the single issues of the entire series, but stopped reading them about a year or so before it ended, and then most of my comics were destroyed in a flood at my parents’ house). I also got a Challengers of the Unknown collection that was recommended in one of the blogs that Alfredo had told me about.

So I didn’t bother going back to the show today, and I’ll just head to Isotope and ask them to order the comics I’d been looking for. And still, for some reason, I’m compelled to go to the San Diego one. Guess I’ve got a few months to see if that compulsion lasts.

That Awkward Phase

One day of WonderCon down, and the magic hasn’t really taken hold of my soul yet. I’m hoping that that’s just because it’s a weekday, and most people didn’t have the luxury of working in the morning (I actually got stuff done this morning; I couldn’t be more proud) and then finishing up later that night.

I’m still hoping for big, balls-out displays of nerdosity; that’s a big part of why I bought a three-day pass, after all. I’m hoping that they just have to build to that, because today all I saw was a dull sense of desperation and melancholy. It was like the computer game developer’s conference, but with more women. A middle-aged guy wearing a Captain America T-shirt a couple sizes too small here, Blue Sun and Browncoats T-shirts scattered about, a whisper thin guy dressed up as a vampire there. I want to see full-on I-don’t-give-a-damn-because-I’m-with-my-people men and women in costumes, dammit.

As it was, I got to just be a nerdy fanboy today, instead of looking at them and making fun, pretending that I’m not one. I was hoping to continue my tradition of stalking Steve Purcell, but he didn’t show up. It’s just as well; the last time I saw him was when he pulled up along side me in Emeryville and he honked and waved. That just ruins it. Some people are just too friendly and unassuming to be stalker victims, no matter how much you like their work.

But I think I made up for it around Mike Mignola, though. There was a long line of people at the Dark Horse booth waiting for signatures when I went upstairs to catch the lecture from Telltale Games. When I came back down, the crowd was gone, so I walked up and pulled out my big hardback copy of Art of Hellboy, only to be stopped by a Dark Horse representative telling me that the signing was closed, and they’d had to turn away people 20 minutes ago. And my puppy had died.

So I awkardly and dejectedly put my book back in my backpack and shuffled across to the Metreon to drown my disappointment in soba. Afterward I caught the end of a session about Mirrormask (which I still haven’t seen but is coming out on DVD next week), and then the Q&A with Mignola. He kept pretty much the entire time open for questions, and there were actually some good questions asked — I didn’t see any awkward and uncomfortable gushing fanboy comments (they wouldn’t give me the microphone, dammit) or just dumb questions.

Actually, I did ask what’s the status of “The Amazing Screw-on Head,” and he said they’re finishing up the pilot and it should air on SciFi this year; he hasn’t seen it. He also said that he didn’t plan to do any more Screw-on Head comics, because everything he wanted to do with the characters and setting, he managed to get in that one book.

Other stuff: Hellboy 2 is in preliminary talks and could be Guillermo del Toro’s next movie; it depends on his schedule. A couple of Hellboy animated movies are in the works to probably air on Cartoon Network; if popular, they could turn into a series. (Mignola later said that they’re in the storyboard phase and he’s acting as a consultant and plotter but isn’t directly involved other than that). In the comic books, Duncan Fegredo is taking over art for the next three Hellboy mini-series; Mignola said that he sees Fegredo’s three series as Act II in the Hellboy story, and when he takes the book back over after that, it’ll be the final act. He finally knows where he wants to take the character and the story. He also said he appreciates the time he has where he doesn’t have to draw Hellboy or BPRD, because he can work on side projects like Screw-on Head.

After all that, he went back down to the show floor and signed more books, and I finally got to get an autograph and a sketch of Hellboy. He was selling sketchbooks celebrating the 10th Anniversary of Hellboy, and I bought one of those, too. I’d brought my copy of Screw-on Head, but said it was so dark there was no good place to sign it, but he did anyway. When I told him that I thought that was my favorite single comic book ever, he replied that it was probably one of his as well; he was really happy with how it turned out. And he didn’t want to push his luck and make another story that wasn’t as good.

Later I saw Scott Shaw! (he uses the exclamation point) at a booth and I stopped by to say that I was a huge fan of Captain Carrot & His Amazing Zoo Crew “when I was a little kid.” I guess that was kind of rude, in retrospect. Ah well, I’m still going through my awkward phase. And he reminded me that they appeared in ~~a fairly~~ the most recent issue of Teen Titans, so I came out learning something. Learning is growing.

Really, though: I still don’t get the whole idea of being laid back and chatting with comics creators at these things. You’re in an artificial situation to start with, there are a ton of people who also want to get in to get an autograph or picture or whatever, and besides, what is there really left to say after, “That was so awesome.” I thought part of the appeal of comic books was that once marked as a fan, you didn’t have to make conversation with people or be socially adept.