Geeky/Random Web Clippings

Apparently post frequency is the new theme here at The Tartar Sauce. Either that, or I've finally become bored with playing video games 24/7, yet still have nothing to do but update a blog. Anyway, here's some random shit from these here internets:

ZeFrank's Gyro.

Draw online, and share it with others.

Some clever advertising.

stomp-esque web short.

Midomi, a music search engine that lets you sing, hum, or tap the tune to find the music.

Screamin' Beans, if you click one thing here, click this.

Remember when the Zune was a big joke?

And finally, for Pat, a random Alias Generator.

Lesser Known Firefox Extensions: FaviconizeTab

 

I suppose while we're on the subject of favicons, I might as well show you another great, lesser known extension that should be built into Firefox.

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FaviconizeTab is pretty simple, it adds the option to shorten a tab to only its favicon, and it's great for use on sites that you leave open a lot, like email, facebook, calendar, rss reader, really anything that you don't need to see the title of. Just right click and "faviconize" it. It conserves really a ton of space, you can fit three or four tabs in the same space as one, and it makes things neater and more easy to handle. It also saves preferences for restored sessions, so it's great if you've set firefox to restore your tabs as well.

Check it out.

FaviconizeTab

Time Waster: Ski Down Mt. Infinity With Ski Runner!

Yea, I've been feeling pretty nostalgic about my old, dead blog lately, and decided to bring back the Time Waster segment, which is essentially a flash game highlight.

Anyway, Ski Runner is the most fun I've had in the browser for a while. You are Mr. Ski Man, and must ride down Mt. Infinity, using the arrow keys to steer and collecting pills to score points and keep your energy up.

That's basically it. Or is it? If your energy bar goes above the halfway point, you'll begin to hallucinate, and that's when the trees start dancing, rocks turn into easter island heads, random words flash on the screen, robots appear, colors flash all around, and various memes visit from all over the internet. Oh, did I mention all of this while great hardcore techno plays in the background? It's pretty sweet. And actually kind of difficult, since you'll inevitably get distracted by a dancing banana or three, and slam into a rock.

A really simple, hilarious, and addictingly fun game.

Ski Runner

Favicons!

Yup, I'm playing around, trying to make a custom favicon for our site. I kinda fail at it, so I figured I'd open it up to anyone.

Email us your own custom tartar-saucey favicon (a 16x16 or 32x32 .png, .gif, or.ico image) and if it's good I'll probably use it. Just send it to tips@thetartarsauce.com, and I'll take a look.

Other authors are welcome to contribute as well.

Lulz of the Time

I may have to change this back to Lulz of the Day. There's just so many lulz, and so little time. Anyway:

You know he's hardcore. Click to enlarge.

Wiki of the Week: A million Penguins

This weeks wiki is an interesting perspective on the anyone-can-edit philosophy. "A Million Penguins" was a collaborative attempt by Penguin books to write a novel using a wiki.

Unfortunately, it turned out to be a really difficult task. There were major simultaneous issues with people making too many edits, and not enough people editing. Eventually the project stopped, with what was, at best, a novella. You can read it in a half hour or so, and it doesn't make much sense. Some view it as a sucess, most as a failure.

Either way, it certaintly changed the way a lot of people thought about collaboration and the internet.

A Million Penguins

and "A Million Penguins" from Wikipedia

Cool Thing of the Week: FarScape

Yea, it's old. Yea, it still rocks. FarScape was a science fantasy TV show that ran in the early 2000's, got canceled, and then due to massive fan movement got a miniseries made to tie up loose ends. Why is this show awesome? 1) Jim Henson's creature shop is responsible for most of the aliens. They're pretty awesome. 2) Fairly mature storylines, once the show gets on its feet in the second season. 3) It's shot in Australia. That means pretty much everyone apart from the main character has an Australian accent (a real one, sounds slightly British, not Crocodile Dundee.) The show poses this question: What would an Astronaut from Earth do, upon finding himself flung through a wormhole to the far reaches of the galaxy populated by weird aliens? The answer's obvious: Go batshit crazy. The main character (John Chrichton) starts becoming more and more unhinged as the series progresses, until plot-critical events cause him to suddenly find ground under his feet. The show starts off rough, with the first season easily being the weakest and most stereotypical, but it turns into one of the greatest science-fantasy shows of all time. Of course, it's not running now, so your only real choice is netflix or buy the DVD's.

It's Official, We're Official!

Hey all! Big milestone here at The Tartar Sauce. I finally got around to getting us a domain with email and everything! So if you go to www.thetartarsauce.com, it should bring you right to our home page!

Don't feel left out if you're already subscribed to our feed or already have us bookmarked though, within a few days (it can take up to 3 days to fully switch over), any link from thetartarsauce.blogspot.com will redirect to our new domain, and until then the blogspot address should still be fully functional.

All of our writers now have fancy "name@thetartarsauce.com" email addresses, and our new site address that you can use to email us tips, complains, suggestions, or whatever is tips@thetartarsauce.com! Of course, our old one still works, but as soon as I get our contact sidebar info up, why would you use it?

We also have a parent company now (since a company was required when I signed up the domain), Spreadable Media, which, at this point, is only exiting to me since it doesn't really exist yet or affect anything.

Thanks for your support in making this possible, you awesome readers you. Let's hope this is the beginning of something great. Domains are the fucking shit!

A Challange!

I hereby offer a challenge to BackdoorAngel and all other contributers to TheTartarSauce: Alpha Centauri. Free for all. Winner picks next multiplayer game to play through. Are you mice or are you men? Edit to add: Mice. Definitely all mice.

Lulz of the Time

 

Some classic Fail right here. I always get a kick out of this one. Click to enlarge.

Summer of Fun

I'll get on with my incoherent ramblings about videogames and art and such in a bit, but first I have an apology to make to Backdoor: Sorry, dude. I left my desktop in storage. No Left 4 Dead for me this summer. Or any Follow Freeman Co-op action either. On the other hand, I think my netbook can handle some Serious Sam action, for which I would be totally down. Obviously, this means my summer of gaming is going to be strictly old-skool. Like, Cornelius Bear driving a yellow bus with Gothic Arches old school. So I've decided to use this time to play through some classics that are in my "pile of shame" that I never got around to finishing. Here's my playlist so far: 1) Planescape: Torment - Finished. This is the finest game to be released on any platform. Period. 2) Thief - Changing pace from RPGness to more FPSish action, should be grand. 3) Grim Fandango - I started it on a long train ride earlier and got stuck. I shall endeavor to finish it without a walkthrough, no promises though. I suck at adventure games. 4) Fallout - Yea, I've played it before. It's just that good. 5) Thief II - More thiefy goodness. 6) Sanitarium - A creative and very unsettling adventure game. 7) System Shock - Because I've never actually finished it, and I should. Then, I'm going to play it again. In French. 8) System Shock 2 - On Insane difficulty, going pure psyOps. Bring it the fuck on. 9) Homeworld - Exodus in Space. With explosions. Since my netbook doesn't have a massive hard drive (solid state and all that) I'm going to have one of the above installed at a time. However, variety is the spice of life, so I've also got Kohan: Ahriman's Gift, a brilliant strategy game, and the beta of Stardock's Elemental. In addition, there's some games that I'll be playing on my GP2x. Beneath a Steel Sky, Secret of Monkey Island, and The Ur-Quan Masters. Lucasarts adventure games are the bee's knees, especially with a touch screen. I'm goingto try and track down I Have No Mouth and I Must Screen for the GP2x, too. Expect pre and post playthrough reports on most f these - except Torment, which is going to be getting alot of attention soon in the "games as art" rantings.

The Tartar Sauce: Stretch Armstrong Edition

Yea, just letting everyone know I'm doing some layout editing to combat our authors tendencies to write "laboriously" long posts. As blogger does not allow post pages (hint hint google), I've decided to now use text that will stretch to the width of the page. There may also be coming changes to our sidebar, and maybe some color changes. Let me know if you love or loathe anything.

Lesser Known Firefox Extensions: Yet Another Smooth Scrolling (oh and some other shit about stuff and junk)

Well, it seems The Tartar Sauce has started it's own impromptu "games as art week." I was thinking of chiming in with my own view on the topic, but instead you might as well just re-read Jake's post, as that's pretty much exactly where I stand. This is interesting as well, if you're bored enough to read yet another article on the topic.

Though (since Bobbicus seems to be going the noble route) I will add this: Roger Ebert can suck it.

I haven't posted in a while, though this time it's not because I've been busy. I sat down to write this article and instead of resting my hands on the home keys, I instinctively rested my left hand on WASD and my right hand on the mouse. You know you're a gamer when.....

If you're interested, the games that I've been wasting away my life on in the past week or so have been: GTA IV, Far Cry 2, Half-Life 2: Episode 1, Left 4 Dead, Tom Clancy's HAWX, GTR 2, GRID, Everyday Shooter, Star Fox 64, Super Smash Bros. 64, and oh god, way too much Call of Duty 4.

And that, for no reason, brings me to the purpose of this post, which is to introduce Yet Another new segment (har har, get it?), called "Lesser Known." In this segment I'll highlight a (here it comes) lesser known piece of software that deserves a little more love. I'll be starting with firefox extensions, since there's a lot of them, not enough people use them, and they're just plain sweet. I had an idea originally to do a firefox post in the same vain as my 10 lesser known music players post, but there's way more kewl extensions that need installing.

The first Lesser Known Firefox extension is called Yet Another Smooth Scrolling:

I consider this a must-install on pretty much every one of my Firefox installations. It's a very simple extension that changes the default, ugly, jagged, ancient default Firefox scrolling action with a smooth, clear one that makes the web a more pleasurable place.

It's actually got a ton of great customization features. There are 3 scrolling presets (each one of them is adjustable) you can choose from to suit scrolling behavior to your mood or preference. Whether you want scrolling to be slow and smooth for reading an essay or long article, or something quick and functional for scanning documents or RSS readers, you can set each preset to meet your needs. Switching between presets is as easy as right clicking anywhere or choosing the icon in the corner of the browser.

Scrolling is very well done, pretty much any settings you choose are going to look great. You won't have to play around with the settings long to find out what you like. I ended up using the default settings for 2 of the 3 presets. It's such a subtle feature that really makes the web so much easier on the eyes, and just makes Firefox look better.

Though there is a downside: More CPU is utilized to create the effect. So if you're on an ancient laptop or trying to conserve battery on a netbook, then maybe disable it untill you're plugged in. It's not like it sucks up all resources, but it's something to be aware of.

Really a great extension that should be built into Firefox.

Yet Another Smooth Scrolling

Games As Art: Round Two - Repudiating Ebert's Argument, finding Art in GTA III

So now I shall continue my argument for games as art. My previous post on the matter, for those who do not wish to suffer through it, can be summed up as follows: Games are a revolutionary art form which use the interactivity between a user and program to create an experience that expresses a significant message, statement, or emotional state. Before I resume my argument, I would like to respond to Jake's marvelous post. Thank you Jake, for proving my most important point - that "art" is different to different people. Jake seems to find any act of creation a work of art, the only quality that can be called into question is the craftsmanship and effectiveness of the product. My view is slightly different, in that Art (with a capital A, mind you) requires intent behind it other than making a profit - hence why most games are disqualified. For example, I don't really consider the Mona Lisa Art. It's a masterpiece of a painting, but as far as I can tell, it's just a portrait, a master painter's attempt to render a compelling image as true to life as possible. Honestly, I don't care - it doesn't change the fact that it's a beautiful and compelling painting. But I digress. Ebert's main argument against games is as follows: "There is a structural reason for that: Video games by their nature require player choices, which is the opposite of the strategy of serious film and literature, which requires authorial control." Anyone who has ever played or designed a game can tell that Mr. Ebert has done neither. Allow me to point out the biggest hole in this argument: Every one of those player choices has to be programmed by a designer. Every last one. In fact, this vision of games as full of player choice is something that the industry has been pursuing for years, with varying degrees of success. Player choice in games, especially with regards to how it affects the overall vision, are miniscule. Let's take GTA III as our example: This game is heaped with praise about being open ended and driven by player choice, and yet there really isn't all that much freedom, from a narrative perspective. Sure, you can run around and cause mayhem and hijack cars at will, but to experience anything other than a very basic game, one has to engage in tightly scripted missions. A player also has no control over the narrative - every player who finished the game is going to complete the main missions, and get the exact same ending. You can't undermine the premise of the game (being a criminal in faux-NYC) by, say, turning yourself in and working as an informant. And why not? Because the designers did not want the player to have that option. One might say that such an option is denied the player by those with "authorial control." Moving on, I would like everyone here to recall the last literature class that you had. Somebody in that class (and this always happens) brought up some exteremely tenous or subtle symbolism, or metaphor, or something, and you thought to yourself "What? You, good Sir (or Madame, for the gentler sex is no less inclined to such flights of fancy), are reading far too much into this. Or perhaps you are making this shit up." Possibly at the time you were polishing your monocle, or puffing thoughtfully on a pipe. The point is, it's very easy to read complexity and depth into things where it doesn't exist. As an example, I'm going to employ GTA III again. Observe: *Ahem* Grand Theft Auto III, or GTA III as it is more commonly known, is largely acclaimed within gaming circles as being brilliant and denounced by everyone else as a corrupting "murder simulator" that sickens the minds of young innocents. However, both parties are missing out on the subtle commentary that GTA provides both on American culture and the Human Condition. GTA is a hyper-violent game set in a city that is clearly directly inspired by New York City. The story follows the rise of a criminal as he shoots, steals, and murders his way to the top of the criminal underworld. Every "mission" assigned to the player by his superiors invariably involves destruction - whether it is murdering the key witness in a case, or "whacking" an informant, or even destroying a cargo ship used by a rival gang to move drugs. But this seemingly mindless violence is very intentional, both in its hyperbolic intensity and seemingly bad taste. Our first clue to the true nature of this game is its developers, Rockstar, a company based in England. Thus the game is by its very nature a commentary on Amercian culture by an outside observer. By examining the game, we can see certain elements popping up time and time again: 1) A glorification of weapons and violence 2) Material possesions being elevated above human life (the notorious "killing a hooker for cash") 3) The relative value placed on human life, especially those of poor and minorites, is very little 4) There is little confidence in the ability of the police to protect citizens, in fact, the police are brutal and seem to relish in using brutality for offences against officers, even minor ones such as lightly bumping a police car with your own. Traffic violations, however, are ignored, as is behaving like a hooligan and recklessly endangering others. This seems to suggest a perception of the Police force as an establishment unconcerned with the maintainence of an orderly society, and more with protecting its own members and standing. In fact, the stiffest penalty faced by even a mass murderer caught by the police is an afternoon in jail and a fine. 5) There is no way for the player to progress in society without resorting to crime. This can be read as a commentary on the idea of the "American Dream" and upward mobility, or rather the lack of it for those without connections or money. In a more meta narrative, the game says this about players: 1) People will enjoy engaging in consequence-free depravity. 2) Most players will at some point, for pure amusement, use weapon and armor cheats to rampage through the city with no intention other than to cause as much mayhem as possible. 3) There are few consequences for failure, even death is little more than a hassle. 4) Massive numbers of people enjoy the extreme violence, over the top gore, and large quantities of sex. These things hold mass appeal Thus, a discerning look at GTA will reveal that there is quite a statement being made about how America is percieved by the outside world. The Hyper-violence and sex-crazed game is actually quite subtle in its message. See? You can do this to any game. Look at it from a different angle and WHAM! Instant Depth! Now I'm pretty sure that the above was not what Rockstart had in mind when they were creating the game, so I wouldn't call it art. In fact the above is bullshit. It's interesting to think about, and (if I say so myself) could be used as the basis for some very interesting discussions, but I really just pulled it out of my ass for this article. The fact remains that games can say a lot if you are willing to look carefully. Next: The Impact of Commercialization on Games As Art, plus a critique of System Shock 2 followed by a side by side comparision of than game and Bioshock. Then: Interactivity as an Art form, Planescape: Torment critique.

Games as Art: A Different Perspective

If you`re a reader of this blog, chances are you like video games, probably a lot. And if you like video games, or, for that matter, if you`ve ever heard of video games, chances are you`re familiar with the debate about whether or not video games are art. It`s a debate that`s been going on for a while, and while a lot of people are understandably sick of it and just want to get on with playing whichever video games they like, I`m glad it`s being addressed on The Tartar Sauce, since, as Bobbicus noted in his excellent post, the debate`s way more complicated than how video games can be classified. Everyone has different perspectives on what art is, and how people classify art influences the reasons why people may or may not think that video games are art. Because of this, there are infinitely many sides to this debate, which is one of the many reasons why it still hasn`t been resolved. I know I`m kind of just repeating what Bobbicus said, but that`s just because I totally agree with that point, which is essential to my argument.

When many people hear the word art, they get images in their heads of aesthetically perfect images, or revolutionary statements, or avant-garde modern artworks. But not all art can, or should, be put on this high of a pedestal. This is why terms like "high art" and "low art" exist (which, in my opinion, are bullshit terms, but I`ll get into that another time). People use the word art to put things on high pedestals all the time; you can hear it whenever people describe a Beatles album or a Tarantino movie as a masterpiece. And this is why people often object to video games being called art; many people don`t think that video games should be elevated to the same status as Renaissance paintings. But many people ignore the fact that, well, frankly, not all art is of the same quality. Putting all your opinions aside for a second, and thinking of art in it`s most literal sense, just answer these questions. You would agree with me that the Mona Lisa is a work of art, right? And you would also agree with me that a painting by Andy Warhol is a work of art, right? After all, Da Vinci and Warhol are both referred to by everyone as artists, and artworks by both of them are prominently displayed in art museums. But would you say that both these paintings are of the same quality? Probably not. Whether you`re a traditionalist who favors skill and aesthetic beauty or a (post)modernist who thinks traditionalists just don`t understand Warhol`s critiques of pop icons, you probably think that one of these paintings is better than the other. But you would still call both of these paintings art. Just keep that in mind.

As I said before, many people disagree with the statement "video games are art" because they don`t want video games to be elevated to such a high status. But many of these people would probably have less trouble with the statement "video games are an art form". The first statement implies that every video game ever made is of the same quality as something like the Mona Lisa. But all that the second statement implies is that video games are something that can be used to make artworks, maybe even of the same quality as what`s shown in museums. It`s much more reasonable to say that video games are an art form. However, while that statement may be easier to accept for many people, it still implies the statement "video games are art", since, logically, something that is made using an art form is naturally a work of art.

And here`s where my argument diverges from the standard ones. All video games are works of art, in my opinion, and if you followed the last paragraph you know why. But that doesn`t mean that all video games are of the same quality. Hell, it doesn`t even mean that all video games are good. Most video games suck, quite honestly. Not all art is good. Just because something`s a work of art, that doesn`t mean it can`t suck.

Case in point: Tommy Wiseau`s The Room. I`m using a movie, rather than a video game, as my main example, but that`s because right now I`m just discussing art in general. Film started out in a similar way to video games. Lots of early films, just like a lot of games from my childhood, were educational, and many people realized quickly that movies, just like games, had enormous commercial potential. Film soon became a primarily commercial medium, and early silent films made huge amounts of money, just like early 8-bit games, both of which are primitive by today's standards but considered cool in a retro way by some. There have been many film-makers that have managed to be commercial while still making artistic statements, for example Coen Brothers or Stanley Kubrick, and there have also been many game developers, like Suda51 (Killer7, No More Heroes) and Fumito Ueda (Ico, Shadow of the Colossus), that have done the same thing. But there are also many less well-known film-makers (Jean Cocteau, Stan Brakhage, and countless others) who have used film as a medium solely for art with no commercial intentions. And, likewise, there are many video game developers (like Daniel Benmergui, who Bobbicus mentioned earlier) who have used video games in the same way.

Anyway, that`s the background. I haven`t actually defined what I think art is yet, and I probably should, so here goes. I think it`s fair to say that art is anything made for non-practical use that is supposed to convey a message or create an emotional state. The Room, a film by Tommy Wiseau, is, by that definition, art. It obviously has no practical purpose, and it is obviously supposed to convey a message and create many emotional states. But you can tell by watching the preview that it does neither of those.

As you can tell, this film sucks. The acting is terrible, the lines are forced and unintentionally hilarious, the characters are generic, the story is filled with plotholes, the music is overly melodramatic, and the entire film is utterly misogynistic. But that doesn`t mean it`s not art. Film is an art form, so by definition this is art. And it`s supposed to convey a message and create an emotional state. Is The Room a work of art? Of course. Does that mean it`s good? Hell no.

When discussing whether or not video games are art, the idea that not all art is good needs to be taken into account, because it would make it easier for everyone. Video game fans are completely justified in saying that brutally violent and misogynistic games like the GTA series are art. But critics are equally justified in saying that these games are terrible, without denying that these games are art. People use the art argument as a defense mechanism all the time, but it`s a misguided defense mechanism. For example, if someone says that Half Life is too violent, a fan might defend the game by saying it`s art. And the fan would be absolutely right: Half Life is art. But that doesn`t in any way refute what the critic says. It`s a different issuse entirely.

So, basically, all video games are art. Insanely epic games like Twilight Princess? Art. Cutesy fun games like Animal Crossing? Art. Excuisitely beauiful games like Shadow of the Colossus? Art. Avant-garde, postmodern games like The Path? Art. Violent, problematic games like Manhunt? Art. Mind-bogglingly shitty games Life of D Duck? Art. Obviously, some of these games are better than others. Some of these games are more artsy than others, and some are more commercial than others. But they`re all art. And that in no way means that they`re all good.

For some more good commentary on this topic, read this, this, and this.

Games as Art: The Marriage of Mechanics and Mesage. Also, a critique of Bioshock

Are videogames art? Simple question, eh? Most gamers would answer with a resounding yes, others (such as Roger Ebert) say no. Frankly I think it's pointless. For one thing, the question assumes that everyone agrees on what art is. This is not true. You ask a thousand different people that question and you will get a thousand different answers. In fact, if one reads Roger Ebert's rebuttal to Clive Barker's comments, you see that their difference is much deeper than whether or not videogames are art - they disagree on what art is. Ebert wants a single coherent experience, whereas Barker bestows the title on anything which creates a profoundly moving experience. Even among general accepted visions of Art, there are differences. A Jackson Pollock piece is considered Art for far different reasons than the Mona Lisa. Another problem is that most people who are upset at Ebert over his comments confuse Artistry with Craftsmanship. There are a lot of really well done games out there. That does not necessarily mean that they are Art. So my definition of a game that qualifies as art would be the following: A interactive work which conveys a message, both through content and game mechanics. The last part is particularly important. In my definition, in order for a game to be art, the mechanics have to mesh with the message. Why? Because otherwise your message becomes window dressing. Let's take the critical darling Bioshock as an example. CASE STUDY: BIOSHOCK Spoilers on the game Bioshock will appear in the following few paragraphs. Quick crash course for those unfamiliar with the title: Bioshock is a first person shooter developed by Irrational Games (the studio was bought by 2K and the name changed to 2K Boston, a slap in the face to the team, really.) It is touted as a "spiritual successor" to System Shock 2, widely hailed as one of the greatest games of all time. Backstory: Bioshock is set in Rapture, an underwater Utopia built by a man named Ayn Rand - er, Andrew Ryan, sorry- who was quite a fan of laissez-faire style capitalism. Rapture had little to no regulation (apart from basics like "don't kill people or take their stuff") and no such thing as taxes. It was a free society, where the only thing deciding succes was personal skill and ambition. Unfortunately, that all went to hell when parasites were discovered on the ocean flor that contained a mysterious substance called Adam, which allowed genetic manipulation. With this people could change anything they wanted about themselves, from their appearance to wether or not they could shet things on fire with their mind. Unfortunately, a man named Frank Fontaine controlled the supply of Adam, which made him extremely powerful. Ryan, fearing that Adam would destroy his precious city, began betraying his own principles and made the substance illegal. Things went downhill from there, especially as people discovered that tinkering with your genes made you completely insane, craving more and more Adam. Eventually the city descends into utter chaos, which is when the player crashes into the ocean right next to the lighthouse which houses the entrance to Rapture. Gameplay: The player follows a linear path through rapture, killing any splicers he runs across and following the directions of a man named Atlas (subtle) who tells him what to do via a radio. There a variety of ways to do this. Conventional firearms are present throughout the game, as are plasmids. One of the big selling points of the game were Plasmids, essentially magic spells (plotwise powers granted through genetic mutation). These include electric bolt (which also electrifies water), pyrokenisis, telekinesis, plasmids which disable security cameras, and plasmids which enrage enemies into attacking their neighbors. There are also "tonics", which are Plasmids that are always on. These generally involve increasing damage done, reducing damage taken, and increasing the effectiveness of certain weapons or plasmids. A player is limited in how many plasmids and tonics they can have, but can purchase slots for both as well as the actual abilities themselves from vending machines scattered around the game, using Adam. The player's primary source of Adam is the Little Sisters, who are little girls genetically engineered to harvest and store Adam. In order to harvest them, the player has to kill their protector (the dudes in diving gear in pretty much every screenshot of the game) and then either "kill" the girl for lots of Adam, or "save" her by removing the parasite for slightly less Adam. The girls themselves are invincible, the parasites in them healing them instantly until you rip them out of their bodies. In addition to killing things, the player can hack most machinery. Hacking is a minigame (basically a version of the classic pipe game) that, if successfully accomplished, allows you to turn turrets against enemies, boobytrap health stations, and get stuff cheaper from vending machines. Finally, if a player dies, he is revived in "Vita-Chambers" with half health. Enemies, however remain at the status they were before the player died. Essentially there's no penalty for dying. Critique: Let me start by saying that Bioshock's setting is absolutely inspired. The underwater city of Rapture is hauntingly beautiful, superbly designed, and refreshingly unique. The story is also intriguing, about a man who started a city with grand ideals, and then became corrupted by power and betrayed those ideals in order to cling to authority. Andrew Ryan's death is moving, in part because of the shocking revelation you recieve, and in part because it is his redemption, his refusal to sacrifice the last belief he hasn't gone back on - "A man chooses, a slave obeys." With all of this wonderful backstory and setting, people have been raving about Bioshock, hailing it as the dawn of a new age of videogames. There's just one tiny problem. Bioshock is not about how men can become inhuman for the sake of survival or power. Bioshock is about shooting things. There's an old axiom of hollywood: "The story comes first." Well videogames also have an axoim: "The gameplay comes first." This is true not only of design, but of conveying a message. In order to find out what a game is saying (not necessarily what the designers are trying to say, which is sometimes completely different), all you have to do is break down what you spend your time doing. In Bioshock, what you do is run around and kill everything in sight, upgrade your ability to kill things, then resume killing things, occaisionally interacting with an object that will open the door and allow you to continue killing things. Everything in the game, from Plasmids to item fabrication, revolves around the player killing the inhabitants of Rapture. Hell, there's not even a modicum of deciding what to kill, the only non-enemies you encounter are invincible. There's not even the threat of death, as magical respawn points litter each level. So what message does Bioshock convey? Certainly not the high-minded (and quite good) narrative that it wraps itself in. Bioshock's message is if it moves, kill it. Bioshock's much touted "morality" is pathetic. Do you slaughter little girls for your own benefit? Or do you "save" them by killing their protectors, removing their invincibility, then casting them off to roam a underwater hellhole populated by mutant freaks who will kill them on sight? Even then, there is no tangible loss to doing what's right - you are rewarded quite well for saving little girls, in fact, you gain unique plasmids. So the choice is less "what are you willing to do to survive?" and more "are you a sadistic killer of children?" Now this wasn't the original plan for Bioshock. The original concept was for Rapture to be an of open world where fighting splicers would be an extremely risky buisiness, death would be just around the corner, and getting in a fight would be entirely avoidable. Unfortunately, the designers erred on the side of mass consumption, and significantly simplified the content of the game in order to cater to the bottom denominator. So what would Bioshock have to do differently in order to meet my definition of art? Let's say we wanted Bioshock to convey the following message both in story and gameplay: Every man has his principles, but each principle has a point where it is overridden by self-preservation. Also, he who fights the monster must be careful not to become the monster. Storywise, Andrew Ryan's principles of free market and no regulation were cast aside when he began to lose power. Gameplaywise, several things could be done: 1) Make the Little Sisters as human as possible, and the only way to get Adam from them would be to actually kill them. Not in a cutscene that fades to black at the moment, but actually making the player pull the trigger (or click the mouse, in this case) and end their life. 2) Make Adam vital. Bioshock is easily beaten with the very first weapon you pick up (the wrench) and the very first plasmid you find laying on the ground (the electric bolt.) These two weapons, used in conjunction, are extremely effective. The only real reason to purchase other plasmids is to play around with new ways of killing things. Make hacking an ability upgraded by Adam, forcing a player to spend limited resources wisely. 3) Make confrontations deadly. An encounter with a splicer should always be potentially deadly. 4) Make ammunition scarcer. 5) If you must have a way to save the little sisters, then make it be an resource-intensive process that forces you to use up precious supplies for altruism. 6) Make the player susceptible to splicer madness. Currently the player can load up on genetic mutations with no ill effect. It would have much more impact if each Plasmid gained added a cost of some kind, either a requirement to consume Adam or suffer damage, or insanity effects, or someting else entirely. 7) No free revival. Ideally no revival at all. 8) Instead of a linear path through multiple locations, have the locations all interconnect, with multiple paths to allow a player to try and avoid large packs of splicers. So what would these changes give us? A game where the player is thrust into hell underwater, where powerful mutants roam looking for their next Adam fix. At first, the player can get by without plasmids, but in order to escape, he has to travel deeper and deeper into the depths of rapture, where more powerful enemies force him to modify his DNA in order to complete. Ideally the player would gradually feel more and more inadequte, until even the most principled of gamers breaks down and slaughters a little sister - "Just one, only because I must to survive, no more after this," etc. The player could go to town with upgrading himself, becoming super powerful but also having a nearly unsatiable apetite for Adam, or he could squander precious resources in order to save the little sisters. Thus, the gameplay mechanics would reinforce the themes in the plot, and you would have Art. Now, would such a game have sold nearly as well as Bioshock did? Of course not. Art is generally not suited to mass consumption, and frankly such a game would be kind of depressing. It's certainly not fantastical escapist entertainment. But it would be brilliant - a game about a city of people who were pushed until they broke, pushing a player until he broke - that's art. There's another aspect of Bioshock that's heralded as brilliant, and that's its meta narrative. In Bioshock, you are forced to do things that most sane people would not do in order to progress the plot. One infamous example is the first plasmid you recieve. It's a brass syringe, laying on the damp floor of a decrepit underwater city, and you're told to inject yourself with the contents. For all you know, that could be filled with sewer waste, and yet you can't proceed until you pick it up and stick it in your arm. Later, it's explained that you are a mutant created by Frank Fontaine to assasinate Adam Ryan, and that you literally have to obey any command proceeded by the words "Would You Kindly..." It's absolutely brilliant. After all, in all games you are forced to perform certain actions in order to continure, because there's a limit to how much can be programed in and if you don't progress, the game sort of just stops. Bioshock acknowledges this, then incorporates this aspect of gameplaying into the plot. Why am I doing what the strange man on the radio is telling me to do? Why can't I just put the damn thing down and wander around on my own? Because I physically can't, I'm brainwashed into doing what he says, and of course I have no idea, because I'm brainwashed. It's pure genius. In fact, Bioshock could do none of the things I mentioned above and it would still be art if it managed to pull this off. Unfortunately, it doesn't. Towards the end of the game, you are released from this mental control, and yet you still have to do exactly what someone else tells you to do. Despite being released from your brainwashing, you still follow someone else's orders to the letter. Plotwise, there's no real reason to. No longer being compelled to follow orders, you could just grab a radio, hed back to the surface, and get your ass out of crazy town. Instead, you have to help save the little sisters. In doing so, you do more insane things, like turn yourself into a big daddy (an irreversible process that goes away in the next scene.) And thus, the brilliant meta narrative falls on its face. In order to make it work, they would have had to open the last bit of the game up. Honestly, even a simple choice would have done: You could help save the little sisters, or you head back to the Bathysphere and go to the surface, abandoning everyone in the crazy underwater city to their fate. Any kind of choice. Alas, instead of being groundbreaking, the endgame is completely cliché, ending in a lame escort mission followed by a shitty boss fight (the two most overused and despised techniques in game making.) Bioshock is nothing more than a standard FPS in a pretty package. So close, and yet so very far from being art. LABORIOUSLY LONG CASE STUDY OVER Of course, Bioshock wasn't meant to be art, and its unfair to fault it for pandering to the masses. Bioshock was fun, stylish, and very well done. I liked Bioshock a good deal. I don't feel it is a spiritual successor to System Shock 2 in any way other than it ripped off mechanics and plotlines to the point of being plagiaristic, but that doesn't mean it was a bad game. On the contrary, it's a great game. It just could have been so much more (and was going to be, if you listened to Ken Levine's pre release promises to fans of SS2.) In a nutshell, that's the main reason why most videogames can't be art - they're built for mass appeal and big sales, not message or impact. Gaming is still a commercial enterprise, and thanks to gluttonous addiction to graphical technology the cost to produce a "competitive" title is far beyond anyone without publisher support - and publishers don't like innovation. It's not a guaranteed return. There are other obstacles to games being recognized as high art - they require a large time commitment, specialized skill sets, and have a tiny tiny shelf life. How many people can pack into a theater to watch a movie? Plus, if you miss the theatrical run, there's a DVD release out in a few weeks. Hell, we can watch movies over a century old on DVD, but we can't play games from 5 years ago on Windows Vista. Books can take more time commitment, but reading is something most people do when they're young. Controlling an FPS can be quite difficult if you didn't grow up doing it. And really, if most gamers can't even finish all their games, how can we get others to make the commitment? I'll touch more on these later, as this post is freakin' massive already, but let me wrap up with this statement: I disagree with Mr. Ebert. I believe the the fact that games are interactive is not preventing them from being art, but in fact makes them the most revolutionary and exciting form of art that Man has yet to experience. I agree with him that the vast majority of games on the market are not art, but I maintain that the medium itself is full of potential just waiting to be tapped. Next time, I'll write about other impediments to games being accepted as art, as well as critique a game that I do believe is a work of art.

Cool Thing Of The Week: Ludomancy

Ludomancy is a Blog by Daniel Benmergui, a talented fellow who writes all sorts of artful games. These games are short, not very hard, and more focused on letting the message shine through than hitting you over the head with it. Some people *cough*Kojima*cough could learn a thing or two about subtlety from this guy. Check it out, play the games, and for God's sake don't read anything about them before you play. Just experiment and have fun.

Little Triggers Part 3

In response to the post in response to my post...

In my post on music piracy I talked about when it's ok to pirate a copy of an album, and I think that my argument can more or less apply to video games as well. As I said before, when a creator of an artwork has already profited a lot from that artwork, then non-physical copies of it should be made available for free.

And I think Square has already profited tremendously from Chrono Trigger. According to Wikipedia, "Chrono Trigger sold more than 2.36 million copies in Japan and 290,000 abroad." So while it hasn't done as well in America, it has still been very successful and Square has profited a lot from it. Because of that, at this point I think it's totally fine to download it illegally.

The argument that Square still gets harmed greatly by this because they just released a port of Chrono Trigger for the DS can also be refuted for several reasons.

1) The product which infringes on copyright is almost an entirely different game. As I said before, people won't play it as a substitute for Chrono Trigger.

2) While this game does essentially force people to pirate a copy of the original Chrono Trigger as well, this will in no way get rid of the market for the port, since it's for a unique handheld system. For this reason, it would make complete sense for a consumer to have as many as three copies of Chrono Trigger at once: the original, which might have been in their possession since it came out; a pirated ROM to play Crimson Echoes; and a DS version to carry around, and to use with special features. In fact, people could even have as many as four copies, since this actually isn't the first time Chrono Trigger has been ported; it was released for the Playstation in a pack with Final Fantasy IV. But I digress. The point is that since the port is for a portable system (no pun intended), especially one as unique as the DS, there will still be a market for it even if people use the illegal ROM to play Crimson Echoes.

3) We're talking about a port. A port of a port, for that matter. The DS version of Chrono Trigger is even less of a new game than the illegal one. I do agree that Square should profit from it, but since less work went into its creation than would have been put into an entirely new game, it's ridiculous to say that Square should profit as much as they did from the original Chrono Trigger. At most, the developers of Crimson Echoes should be forced to wait a little bit to release this game. Although that might even be too much, since the DS port has been around for a little while now.

So the main reason I think that this ROM hack is ok is because in this case, at this point, Square has had many chances to profit from the original work already. But are ROM hacks ok in every case? Well, in theory no. But in reality, I'd say that ROM hacks are OK the vast majority of the time. The reason is that, as I've said before, I think that piracy is OK after the creator has profited significantly from the artwork. And by the time that a game becomes significant enough for fan-made ROM hacks of it to be made, chances are the creators have already profited a ton. So if someone made a ROM hack tribute to World of Goo, for example, then that would be kind of fucked up. But that's way less likely to happen than someone making a ROM hack tribute to an emulated Final Fantasy game. So while in some instances ROM hacks are really harmful, those instances probably won't happen very often, and when they do they should just be taken in a case by case basis.

And I'll also say that because they involve illegal downloading, ROM hacks are definitely not the fairest way to go about making tribute games. But, I still think they should be protected legally in most cases, since it's even less fair to give excess profits a higher priority than a wide variety of art. While a ROM hack wasn't the best way to go about making Crimson Echoes, that's not justification for the entire game being destroyed. I understand why allowing its existence would set a bad legal standard for Square, since copyright laws allow companies to protect their products , and since this would chip away at the protection Square has of Chrono Trigger. But I honestly think that copyright laws give companies too much protection over their products. Just look at Mickey Mouse for proof of this. Disney has made millions and millions of dollars off of Mickey, and copyright laws still won't let his image be used by anyone else, even though Disney doesn't need this money anymore. I can understand why copyright laws give companies so much protection over their products; struggling companies absolutely need it. But already successful companies don't need this protection. Square doesn't need this protection. At least they don't need Chrono Trigger to be protected. Square and Chrono Trigger are so successful and so well established that even if this game means reduced sales for them, these reduced sales are not a threat, and even if other people use Chrono Trigger features in other artwork, they will never really be separated from Square. It's fair to give Square a little bit of this protection until they make a significant amount of money off of the DS port, at least considering what work was put into its creation. But Square does not need unlimited protection of Chrono Trigger. Even if Squaresoft were to somehow lose their copyright on Chrono Trigger (which is so incredibly unlikely), no one else would gain that copyright, which means that it would essentially be in the public domain, which it probably would be by now if Disney weren't so disgustingly protective of their copyrights, and which would still allow Square to profit from it more than anyone else. So I'll conclude by saying that while I'm not in favor of ROM hacks, I'm even less in favor of companies that have already benefited a lot from an artwork forcing people to buy that product when, quite frankly, they'll still make tons of money that they don't need. I wish that Crimson Echoes had been made in a different way, but I wish even more that it was able to exist.

Little Triggers Revisited

I'd like to take a moment to revisit the story posted last week about Squaresoft shutting down a fanfic game. I've changed my position on this, and I think shutting down the project was fully justified. You see, this wasn't simply reusing art assets, characters, the battle system, and everything else from Chrono Trigger into a new game, this was a ROM hack. Essentially, in order to play this game, one would have to own a ROM of Chrono Trigger. For those of you who don't know, a ROM image is a file that allows somebody to play console games on a computer, using emulator software. Essentially, the computer simulates a Super Nintendo and the ROM goes about its business. Emulation is awesome, but very resource intensive and a gray area legally. Emulators themselves are completely legal, but ROMS are not, despite the fact that cartridges are not produced anymore. For the record, I have a portable media player with NES, SNES, and Gameboy emulators on it that I have all of my childhood favorites on. Most of them I owned physical copies of, but not all. But I digress. Anyway, so the issue here is that playing Crimson Echoes would require a person to download a ROM and apply the hack. Essentially, encouraging piracy. Had Sqauresoft allowed this, it would have set a very dangerous legal precedent for them. I've seen many people compare this to Modding, saying things like "Half-Life was popular because of Mods!" First off, Half-Life was not as popular as it was due to modding, Half-Life was popular because it was a damn fine game. In fact, Half-Life was a popular game to mod in part because it was so highly praised and widely played. If you're going to make a mod, you want the most people to be able to play it. Now, modding did give the game its ridiculously long shelf life (it was on Wal-Mart shelves up until its sequel came out) and certainly contributed to its appeal, but basing Half-Life's success on its modability is a faulty argument. Second, a ROM hack is not a mod. Period. Mods involve making changes to a legitimate copy of the game to alter the play experience. Everyone that played a Half-Life mod had to have a copy of Half-Life. A ROM hack is altering an illegal copy a game. Since Chrono Trigger has never been offered in ROM format, the ROM hack is inherently illegal. This isn't to say that legality is the end-all be all. I support the Abandonware concept, even if it isn't legal. However, a company has to constantly protect its copyrights or lose them. Not shutting down this game would have been legally disastrous for the company. Finally, there is a possibility for lost sales here. Chrono Trigger was recently released for the DS. Now, normally a fan work would not be a threat, since most fan works are nowhere near as high quality as a professional release (for proof, look at some trailers for Crimson Echoes. The writing's pretty cringe-worthy) However, to play Crimson Echoes, one would have to have a Chrono Trigger ROM, thus having less motivation to purchase Chrono Trigger DS - or so the logic goes. Now I think it's pretty much BS, but the courts don't, and failure to clamp down on this could be seen as a failure to secure the Chrono Trigger IP. In conclusion, Squaresoft is still a bunch of dicks for waiting until the last minute (and for not responding to the demand in the first place,) but the Crimson Echoes team pretty much brought this on themselves. For an example of a proper way to go about being an over-enthusiastic fan, check out Chrono Symphonic. These guys essentially wrote a script to a Chrono Trigger movie and then composed the score to it, remixing the original songs. Some of them are very high quality. It's a good example of what Jake's always talking about - fans using something they like as inspiration and modifying it to create something new.

Cool Thing of the Week: Barkley, Shut Up And Jam: Gaiden

Jake's post inspired this Cool Thing Of The Week Feature. You see, I've never been able to get into Japanese RPG's at all. I usually get tired of all the grinding and angst and just get bored. But in my lifetime there have been three JRPG's that I have managed to finish: Chrono Trigger, Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars, and Tales of Games Presents: Chef Boyardee's Charles Barkley, Shut Up And Jam: Gaiden: Chapter One of the Hoopz Barkley Saga. Barkley, Shut Up and Jam: Gaiden is absolutely brilliant satire. Not only is it a send up of all things JRPG (and quite a few things regarding PC gaming,) it's a geniuinely good game. The story is interesting, the battle system requires a lot of player interaction, and most importantly there's no grinding. You can pretty much coast through this game, but that doesn't mean it isn't fun. The humor in CB,SUAJ:G is sometimes overt, many times subtle, and always hilarious. This isn't simple parody, that's been done to death. This is a loving homage that knows and embraces the flaws of its inspiration. Everything about the game is ridiculous, from the story to the status effects (normal effects like confusion and poison are replaced by Aspergers and glaucoma, cured by alcohol and "chup") but every thing is played completely straight faced. It's short, fun, and absolutely brilliant. Go play it now.

Little Triggers

Greetings from Japan, everyone. As Backdoorangel stated before, I won't be posting as frequently to The Tartar Sauce for a while, while I'm in Japan. I'm still posting regularly for my new Gaikokujin Blog, but as most of the new ideas I'm getting for posts now are Japan-related, I'm reserving them for that blog. 

But, of course, whenever I get inspired to write about something unrelated to Japan, it goes straight to The Tartar Sauce, and today I stumbled upon this article. If you're feeling too lazy to read its three paragraphs, it basically says that Square Enix has just sent a cease and desist letter to the creators of Chrono Trigger: Crimson Echoes, a 35-hour game that was based on Chrono Trigger and made entirely by fans (so this post is related to Japan, but not related to my own experiences in Japan). Of course I wish this didn't happen, but if it had to happen then I wish it was during piracy week. If you read my post on music piracy, you'll know that while I'm somewhat against illegal downloading, I'm completely in favor of illegal art forms such as remixes, mash-ups, and, in this case, what could accurately be described as fan-fiction. I feel that in general as long as a consumer pays for a product, allowing the producer to profit from it, then that consumer should be able to use that product as a basis for new production. If someone obtains a recording of a song in an ethical way, then they should legally be able to make a remix of it. If someone legally reads a book (although it's pretty hard to illegally read a book), they should legally be able to make fan-fiction based on it. And, if someone legally obtains a video game, they should legally be able to hack it and make a new video game based on it. The only catch is that everyone should cite their sources when they make fan-art. Thus, culture becomes richer since amateurs are able to respond to influential artworks, and professionals are still able to profit, since people have to obtain their artworks legally, and since when sources are cited it prevents plagiarism and leads to more people finding out about the original artists. 

Therefore, I'm really sad that this new, exciting fan-art was crushed. If you read the article, you'll see that not only will the game not be released, but that its creators destroyed it. No one will ever be able to play it. Does anyone else agree with me that this is a little extreme? Especially since no one was really harmed by this fan-art being created. No one is going to play this game as a substitute for Chrono Trigger. Most of the people who play it will probably do it because they loved the original Chrono Trigger, which they have already purchased and played. And all the people who played the fan-game and not the original would certainly want to play the original afterwards. This game is not plagiarism, since it is an entirely new game. And, judging by how it was created, I bet that this game would have been released for free, or at least without DRM, so the creators wouldn't profit that much from it either. And even if they did, it would be OK, since it's not a copy of the original. This is different from someone downloading an illegal copy of Chrono Trigger. In that case, Squaresoft gets hurt. This is someone downloading a different game that was meant to be downloaded and that promotes the game it was based on. This basically would have been free publicity for Squaresoft. 

And, technically, it still is. But it's bad publicity. This cease and desist letter just makes Squaresoft look like the big bad mega-company treading on the weaker indie game developers. When I read this, I couldn't help but think of an earlier case involving two music groups, Negativland and U2. Heard of U2? Haven't heard of Negativland? Good. That's the point of this story. One time, Negativland sampled a U2 song in one of their songs, and were sued for more money than they even had. U2 didn't need the money. And they weren't harmed by the new song that Negativland made. All that happened was that while an underground band failed, U2 profited and became the epitome of corporate rock, assigning money a higher value than art. That's basically what Squaresoft is doing right now. And that's hard for me to say, since I love Squaresoft games. But I've hated on Squaresoft before and I'll do it again. My love of Squaresoft games doesn't compensate for the fact that right now they're doing something absolutely terrible, abusing their power to no good end by crushing weaker game developers.

Leonard Katzman mentioned in his post that copyright is intended to "promote the progress of science and useful arts." While you could argue that video games are not "useful," you can still see that there's a point at which copyright laws halt the progress of the arts. Copyright laws that prevent people from playing Chrono Trigger for free promote the progress of the arts, since they allow companies like Squaresoft to profit. But copyright laws that prevent people from making tribute games halt the progress of the arts in a really obvious way. At this point, copyright laws simply cause companies that are already rich to benefit while underground artists fail. This is exactly what happened with Chrono Trigger and with U2 and Negativland, and it's terrible. How does this promote the progress of the arts? It doesn't. Squaresoft wouldn't lose any money because of this tribute game (in fact, they may be losing money now that they're preventing it's creation). And even if this legal action were causing them to make more money, this still wouldn't be promoting the progress of the arts unless, for example, Squaresoft couldn't make FFXIII without the money that they were losing (which they aren't actually losing). Sorry if that argument's really convoluted, but basically what I'm trying to say is that copyright laws against remixed art-forms don't promote the progress of the arts. Instead, they stop it. Companies argue that they lose money because of remixed art, but

a) that's debatable, and

b) even if they did, they wouldn't feel it as much as remix artists who can't make their art anymore. Therefore, these laws halt the progress of the arts.

It IS possible to have it both ways. It IS possible to have copyright laws prevent illegal downloading but promote remix culture. This is the only way for copyright to truly promote the progress of the arts.

3D Realms Bids Adieu

I'm rather torn upon hearing that 3D Realms will be closing down. See, 3D realms almost single handedly redefined what games could do back in the '90s. Starting off as Apogee Software, they introduced Duke Nukem (one of my gateway games - see my intro post) and Rise Of The Triad (which you can get now on Good Old Games). They helped produce or publish a number of other games, including Wolfenstein 3D. When they moved into the 3D playing field, they made one of the first FPS' with drivable vehicles (Shadow Warrior) and, of course, Duke Nukem 3D. Duke Nukem 3D is the distilled essence of an FPS. It has a loud, vibrant main character who is a pastiche of genre clichés and a product of his times. It has satisfying weaponry, huge environments that react to your presence, a nice dose of mysogyny, and of course, lots of explosions, gore, and flying limbs. Duke 3D is juvenile, that's for sure, but it knows it and revels in it. Whether it's the Duke rattling off his crude one-liners (the best are outright stolen from Sam Raime's The Evil Dead movies) or the strippers that you can tip for a dance, Duke 3D reeks of adolescent fantasy. Duke is the ultimate badass, hell, take a look at him: Look at that haircut, those bulging muscles, that look of nonchalance as he wades through his enemies (alien invaders out to conquer the Earth and kidnap our "babes" for nefarious purposes) with a cigar clamped between his teeth, clad in a red muscle shirt and sporting a flattop haircut. Duke didn't just parody the '90s tough guy, he was the '90s tough guy. Duke stomps his way through cities, military installations, and alien spaceships, laying waste to alien and environment alike. Duke 3D was the first game to really feature interactive environments. Sure, you could push a button in Quake, but Duke let you so such things as smash apart fire hydrants - and then drink from the resulting spray to heal yourself. Duke could even actually heed nature's call in a restroom, something which still really hasn't caught on, for some reason. Of course, being able to break stuff isn't going to be any fun if the environments aren't interesting. Fortunately, Duke 3D delivers. The environments were varied, ranging from Death Row to a space station to a burnt out hotel. All were populated with destructible objects, beautiful backgrounds, and tons of little details that breathed life into the game and really made the locations feel like a world, and not just a level. There's lots more great things to be said about Duke 3d (most already said better by others,) but really the best thing to do would be to head over to Good Old Games and experience it yourself. So after Duke 3D became a huge hit, 3D Realms naturally followed up with a sequel, titled Duke Nukem Forever. This, unfortunately, would ultimately become 3D Realm's legacy. You see, Duke Nukem Forever started production in 1997 - and still hasn't been released. 12 years later. It's been a running joke for the past decade, with 3D Realms popping in every once in awhile to show off a screenshot or a trailer and insist that work is going great and the game will be released "when it's done" I actually think that the 2001 version would have been perfect: Massive environments, Big-Ass aliens, exotic weaponry (an antique cannon comes into play at one point), crazy vehicles, interactivity, babes, and enough testosterone to drown Cthulhu. It's so ridiculously over the top and epic. Las Vegas is the perfect setting for a Duke game, and it has such a Hollywood Blockbuster feel to it that's very Duke. More importantly, the technology presented would actually justify the game coming out 10 years after its progenator - such scale would never have been possible in 1998. Unfortunately, 3DR got bit by the "OMG GR4PHX!!!11!" bug and switched engines about 8 times, causing the game to never be released. It's sad that this has pretty much been all 3DR is known for, because in that time period they have been involved with some pretty important stuff. Max Payne, which they produced, introduced Bullet Time (which went from innovative feature to overdone cliché in about 6 weeks) and Prey, which they originally started developing but then outsourced when they found that they just couldn't finish the damn thing. 11 years later they actually published it, and to everyone's surprise it was actually good, thus proving that vaporware did, in fact, have a chance of coming out ok. But all in all, I'm glad that 3dR is shut down. First, they can go out with what little dignity they have left, and second, Duke should stay in his 1996 incarnation. PC gaming has grown up since then. A Duke game coming out today would be kind of like The Music Man being introduced to Broadway - that sort of wholesomeness, without a shred of irony, just wouldn't fit compared to Rent and Hair and Avenue Q and all the other "edgy" stuff that's all the rage now. Same with DNF - it simply wouldn't fit in with the likes of Half-Life 2 and F.E.A.R. and Call of Duty. For example, look at the 2008 "No really, we are making progress, we Swear!" trailer put out by 3DR in 2008: Duke comes off less as a total badass and more as a egotistic prick. Which he is. But it's not cool anymore. And his one liner - insinuating that he wants to chase down aliens so he can shit in them- is just creepy. He's less someone you want to save the world and more someone you want to put on a sex offender list. Another interesting point: unlike the last trailer, this doesn't even have any in-game footage. Progress, indeed. Also, the difference in technology between now and 2001 has basically been negligable in terms of what can be accomplished - it just looks prettier. So Duke gains no benefit from coming out in this era then in 2001. In fact, it would have probably suffered for it, seeing how Duke is essentially a cartoon, a caricature. Also, note the tonal shift. The bright colors and over the top action of the first are replaced by Doom 3-esque shadows and grittyness - not exactly Duke's forte. Duke was a product of his time, and his time is gone. Let's just remember him in his prime. 3DR couldn't get their act together and so they went under. They are gone but not forgotten. But seriously, isn't that first trailer epic? I still want to play that game!

Yahoo Search Sucks

It really does. I typed "thetartarsauce" into its toolbar and it sent me to celebrity photos. Google at least has the decency to send me to recipes.com

Cool Thing Of The Week: Launchy

Do you have a cluttered desktop? Do you hate trolling through the Start menu looking for program icons? Are you awesome? If you answered yes to any of these, you should get Launchy. Launchy is a lightweight program that lets you, well, launch any program from your keyboard, quickly and easily. All you have to do is hit Alt + Space to bring up the search box (pictured,) then type the name of the program. Launchy is smart, too- it brings up your most commonly launched programs first. For example, if I type "f", it brings up Firefox. If I want to launch firefox, I just have to hit enter. If I want to launch, say, Fiilezilla, I add an "i" to bring that up. The box disappears when you launch a program or hit enter on an empty textbox. It's got all sorts of plugins and stuff that I never bother with, but if you're a plugin junky like BackdoorAngel is then you'll probably have lots of fun. Anyway, I have it on every installation of Windows and count it as essential. Check it out.

Silly Impromptu Internet Uprisings. Also, Save Chuck!

It seems the fans of geeky, action-comedy series Chuck have taken to bombarding the "News From You" section of NBC (basically the editorial) with Chuck testimonials. NBC has been unclear as to whether or not there will be a third season of Chuck for some time now. The show has gathered a rather large cult following fairly quickly over its first two seasons, and, with the season finale recently released, well, just check out the recent posts:

There are hundreds of pages of this on the site, and I don't think it's going to end soon. If you haven't had a chance to see chuck, I highly reccomend you check it out. The show is really, really good. Very good dialog, funny, addictive (if not a little ridiculous) plot, good action, and quirky characters. If I had to compare it to something I'd say it's like a mix of Burn Notice (which I absolutely love) and The IT Crowd/ Big Bang Theory. If you're already a fan of chuck, why not post a testimonial? It certaintly couldn't hurt. You'll need a myNBC account to do it, but it's fairly straight forward. Anyways, good luck, Chuck!

Cool Thing Of The Week: Girl Genius

Webcomics are a mixed bunch. Usually they're labors of love done by amateur hobbyists, with varying degrees of quality and consistency. Have you ever heard that saying that you can only pick two out of three options for service - good, fast, or cheap? Meaning that you can get good service cheap, but it won't be fast, fast and cheap, but not good, etc. Well, webcomics tend to have the same thing, but with different qualifiers - Good art, good writing, and good updating schedule. For example, Erfworld and Order of The Stick, both of which are brilliantly written with great art (even though one has stick figures,) have update schedules that can most kindly be described as "erratic." Not to mention the fact that they're both hosted on Giant In the Playground, which always takes ages to load. Girl Genius is the rare example of a comic that hits all three. Perhaps because it started as a print comic that transitioned into a webcomic, or perhaps because the minds behind it is the veteran comic artist and writer duo Phil and Kaja Foglio, who have the additional advantage of being married and thus insulated against the communications breakdowns that plague internet collaborations. Whatever it is, Girl Genius manages to produce amazing work three days a week, with few interruptions. I've been reading it for the past three years, and not once have I been dissapointed with the story or visuals. I'm a sucker for anything steampunk (or Gaslamp Fantasy as the Foglios prefer to call it) and Girl Genius delivers an epic story with great characters, great plot twists, and great visuals. The world is unique and fully realized, the characters have genuine growth and complex motivations, and the comic pulls off the incredible by being both dramatic and hilarious. Check it out, it's totally worth your time.