oh yeah

Pretty much decided to move to tumblr.

http://news.wetgenes.com/ should take you there or where ever it is I end up in the futures.

Bitch and whine like a gamer?

So I saw this link on joystick,
http://www.joystiq.com/2008/11/17/blood-of-bahamut-ds-debut-trailer/


Looks like it might be interesting, obviously has some shadow of the colossus inspiration but is also obviously not the same game. I'd pick god of war if I was going to describe what I saw. Anyway I take a mental note to keep an eye out for the game but before I move on I make the mistake of scrolling down to see what the "Gamers" think.

Yet again I have to ask myself the question, do these morons even like games?

Above all I would like to know how comparing a game to another game is an insult, when that other game is actually an excellent game?

That makes no sense whatsoever.

First off this does not look like just an exact copy.

But if it was?

If you told me I could buy another 10 levels of colossus, the exact same game just some new levels.

I'd be over the moon with joy.

If only the gamers liked games as much as developers like games you might find the world was full of better games.

WetVille : How to grow a speed balloon

An informative video, showing how to use the new gardening system in WetVille to grow a very special balloon.

You may only get this balloon by growing it, so watch carefully if you want one.

The growing time in this video is sped up, normally it would take much longer to go from planted to harvest.

In defence of science and WOW

Braid's marketing rubs me the wrong way, I understand why it is necessary, I understand exactly what it is. Still it makes me feel icky, all I'm doing here is attempting to put my finger on exactly why.

Mr blow is well known for the opinion that World of Warcraft is an evil drug-like substance and Braid is presumably intended not to be an evil drug-like substance.

However, things are often not that simple. When dealing with a large complex system such as a group of people, strange results are the norm.

Warcraft has a social game, it is a "What is the fastest way of grinding?", "What is the best way to get this super drop?". All simple questions that give complex answers.

Braid also includes an intended social game of sorts, it's a "What the fuck is this pseudo intellectual emo fag story?". This is intended to increase the reach of the game by encouraging discussion. We all know that the emo fags (many are useless games journalists) sure do like to talk.

There is some evidence that suggests that braids social game encourages superstition and WOWs social game actually encourages science.

Braids design encourages people to look at say the list of control keys and believe that they are being shown an important secret that will unlock the meaning of the universe. Construct elaborate theories that fit all the "facts" perfectly and therefore must be true. Then to launch on a religious crusade, demanding that people understand that their interpretation of an intentionally vague text is the right one and that all heretics must die.

OK, a little extreme but really, braids meta game is intended to produce the start of that behavior. Once that ball is rolling its hard to get it to stop.

WOW on the other hand is a godless grind, but, it is still primarily a game, part of braid is also a game, I have no problem with that part. It is the other part that irks me. The meta game of WOW is largely comprised with building up scientific data about the underlying game and then attempting to use this data to gain a better understanding of the hidden mechanics of the game world, experimenting and learning. This is called the scientific method.

Which puts us in an interesting place, WOW may be an evil grind but is superstition really a better thing to encourage than science?

Superstition holds us back far more than peoples addiction to grinding video games. Again I feel that there is a failing to understand exactly how dumb the audience is and that we have here an actual net gain from WOW and a net loss from braid.

Even you tube comments are a step up from watching daytime TV.

Any game, with any complex challenge encourages this sort of smart behavior. Games that distance themselves from being games and smother themselves in bullshit, well I for one am certain that they are the greater problem.

a test wetville video

It is no secret that I do not like ratings

Mining the wisdom out of crowds is not easy, it is however easy to find false wisdom and pretend that it is real wisdom.

At the most basic level of many failed attempts is the following problem.

Collapsing the positive and negative parts of any experience down into a single number between 1 and 5 is fucking retarded and impossible.

Displaying that number to others and then asking them to do the same is even more retarded and just creates a feedback loop.

This doesn't matter to the content aggregator, they win whatever content ends up on top as long as they are the one aggregatng it. But for the content creator this is a mess that only succeeds in devaluing all content.

Here is a link to a link to some research that shows a huge problem with everybodys mind. Any random statistics displayed next to content will drown out the content. This works, you have seen it work, you know that it works.

When I say everybody I include myself, it can of course be combated on a conscious level but only if you notice it happening. That's the problem, it is somewhat similar to some visual illusions, you will continue to see the false image no matter how sure you are that it is false. When you talk in terms of website users and include feedback loops, this sort of thing is highly effective, more effective than anything else anyway.

http://www.mindhacks.com/blog/2008/10/false_advertising_st.html


Remember if one is to understand the audience one must first understand this zen koan.

"Participants were given a choice between a short proofreading task that would award 60 points and a longer proofreading task that would award 100 points and were told that 60 points would entitle them to a serving of vanilla ice cream and 100 points would entitle them to an equally large serving of pistachio ice cream. Most participants opted for the longer task. But when asked later which flavor they would enjoy more, most favored the vanilla ice cream."

World of goo is pretty damn sweet.

World of Goo Trailer 2 Director's Cut
by 2dboy

You have no excuse not to go play the demo right now.

That link seems to be the best one, after clicking on download there is a I don't want to have to log in option unlike all the other links I can find. http://2dboy.com/ is their main site, but doesn't have any better download links.

I really don't understand, 32meg is only slightly bigger than many flash games and every site you hit a login and pay for bandwidth wall. A very horrible user download experience.

A simple amazon s3 download page + google ads would probably come out at a profit guys, go make one :)

Anyhow, go play the demo, nicest game to come along in quite a while.