Hey y'all! New episode is up, and its awesome! This is my favourite pulp science fiction novel, Galactic Patrol!
June 9, 2011
May 25, 2011
WRA Episode 24 - Operator 5 and Death's Ragged Army
Well, it took me a week to get it read, scripted, filmed, and put together (as I literally had to change gears and use a different book than I was originally scheduled to review)...but the new episode of Warning! Readers Advisory! is finally up.
Last week we looked at a classic Doc Savage story from 1932, but now we're skipping 4 years ahead to the eve of World War II as we join Secret Service Operator #5, America's Undercover Ace, as he fights to repel the dreadful forces of the Purple Empire in America's Second War of Independence! (...no, not shitting you, that's the phrase the book uses)
So without further ado, I present for the approval of the Midnight Society:
OPERATOR 5 AND DEATH'S RAGGED ARMY!
Last week we looked at a classic Doc Savage story from 1932, but now we're skipping 4 years ahead to the eve of World War II as we join Secret Service Operator #5, America's Undercover Ace, as he fights to repel the dreadful forces of the Purple Empire in America's Second War of Independence! (...no, not shitting you, that's the phrase the book uses)
So without further ado, I present for the approval of the Midnight Society:
OPERATOR 5 AND DEATH'S RAGGED ARMY!
May 17, 2011
WRA Episode 23 - Doc Savage and the Meteor Menace
I kick off Pulp Month with a review of one of my favourite pulp novels, the third adventure of the Man of Bronze:
DOC SAVAGE AND THE METEOR MENACE!
DOC SAVAGE AND THE METEOR MENACE!
On the Paper Trail: Persuasive Games
Welcome back boys and girls we are back on the paper trail. This time we are going to hit the text books hard with the new title called Persuasive Games: The Expressive Power of Videogames by Ian Bogost. Now as you can imagine this is a book for game designers who design video games. Whenever I read books talking about game design or game theory I tend to lose a little of myself in the process since I realize the process behind the curtain. So if you want to protect the innocence and play games for games sake do not look into these titles, however if you play games merely to study them (like myself) read on.
So this book talks about the essence of persuasion. What exactly it means to convince someone to go an either take action to do something or give an opinion on the means that the game presents itself. Now for the vast majority of the titles mentioned in this book you are going to not likely hear about in the past, since the topic of persuasion tends to go into either education, advergames, or political tones. However the core mechanics is as such that you can infer to use in other genres.
The core of the book is a discussion about how mechanics can be tweaked to the point to encourage an outcome that will make the player either do the appropriate action you want them to do (volunteer to support a local candidate), expose a fundamental flaw in the process something is using thus causing a call for action (boycotting Kinko's due to the poor practices they use) or even make social commentary that may influence people (eating healthy items is harder to do due to the food industry setting a premium on them).
The crux of the manner is simply writing the various procedures to influence the action that takes place to learn an inherent message that is not presented directly to the player, but rather inferred when analyzing the mechanics and drawing out a conclusion for it. Now as you might have guessed this can be a very powerful tool if used in the wrong hands. In all the cases the main message done took place and overall can either be a positive or negative message depending on how crafty the designers incorporate it. A great example pointed out by the book is the fact a beer company endorsed their beer to be incorporated into Tapper, a game which highlights the flaws of going out drinking.
At the end it poses the ultimate question of whether or not the creation of a game that's sole purpose is to convince the player to go and take a specific action. It leaves it ambiguous due to the nature of the titles of this book being both positive and negative in their messages, however ends with the notation that, as with all other media, we should know that the medium is doing this, realize why they are doing this, and then make our own decision to follow it or not.
This book allowed my analysis eye to open up a bit and made me go and look back at some titles that I actually own, one of which being Actraiser. The whole point of the game is to give your holy help to the various towns in the world by taking away the very threats given to them in the first place. However at the end of the game, once the ultimate threat is gone no one actually praises your deeds anymore and every city moves on to have a more free thinking environment then one governed by the God who actually created them. Is the game trying to convince me that religion is nothing more then a crux society uses to call for help, and once all them are gone will we forget about it?
All of these games are trying to convince you of something when you play whether they intended to or not, however the one point can be made is that in order to ensure the message gets sent correctly designers need to ensure that they are sending it correctly and as gamers we are recognizing this and take an informed stance on the issue rather to simply agree or disagree on it solely based on what the designers intended to be. If you are a game studier pick up this book. Next time will be...a novelization of a game. Which game will it be? Stay tuned to find out.
April 20, 2011
Off the Beaten Path: Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks
The following was taken from Coldguy's side project On the Paper Trail. For more reviews like this check out the blog.
Hello everyone welcome to...well we are not on the trail per say just merely off the beaten path. This will contain books that do not have a direct interaction with gaming however can easily be tied into them. It may sound confusing right now but when I talk about Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks you will get a better idea.
This book at its core is a chronicle of a midlife crisis and one man's journey to figure out his fantasy desires in the real world. It started with a D&D obsession as a teenager, and then college came and vowed never to play it again...until he turned 40. As with many people at that age people tend to think if they chose the right decision when they were younger and through a series of events find his old D&D books. To figure out where his fantasy urges lay in the real world he sets off for an adventure to discover the fantasy side of people.
This book goes into a modern D&D game session, a reunion of old D&D players, LARPs, Dragon*Con, Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) areas, Wizardrock (i.e Harry and the Potters), and yes even fantasy video games with the focus on WoW. Through this journey he talks about various reasons of escape as a means to cope with reality, and even going as far as trying to find a proper balance between the fantasy world and the real world.
Now if you have been following these reviews you know a title I have done earlier was Reality is Broken by Jane McGonigal and the various themes of explaining how escapism is used to deal with real world issues on a person hit home in an unscientific manner. Jane uses the escape to allow us to achieve more then what we believe we can in reality with Fantasy Freaks argues that we escape to make reality simpler to manage and easier to control.
Both people are correct for vastly different reasons, I wonder if Fantasy Freaks went ahead and read Reality is Broken if he would agree with Jane's viewpoint or stick with his own.
As for the video game point of view he does talk about being addicted to video games, even talks to a self help survivor of it. Although the addict argues that video games are evil he simply states at the end that he was really into self help tapes, thus indirectly saying that it might not be video games but the addict within a person that latches on to a particular vice and rolls with it.
In the end he came to a realization where he realizes the true meaning of imagination and dreams, it is not to simply live in a fantasy land instead of reality. We escape or use our imagination in order to create. I believe he hit the nail right on the head with this, as imagination allow us to make world or things that we know do not exist and them into a somewhat tangible reality for people to interact with, some people take it to the extreme and actually try to immerse themselves into their fantasy 24 hours a day but as Jane pointed out in her book doing it for more then 3 hours a day is unhealthy for anyone to do.
All in all a book I can highly recommend if you ever dreamed about Harry Potter, Tolkien or even the fantasy genre itself. It gives a great perspective on how to balance the adult life with your inner child and has valuable advice to anyone who has the same issue the author has in this.
Hello everyone welcome to...well we are not on the trail per say just merely off the beaten path. This will contain books that do not have a direct interaction with gaming however can easily be tied into them. It may sound confusing right now but when I talk about Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks you will get a better idea.
This book at its core is a chronicle of a midlife crisis and one man's journey to figure out his fantasy desires in the real world. It started with a D&D obsession as a teenager, and then college came and vowed never to play it again...until he turned 40. As with many people at that age people tend to think if they chose the right decision when they were younger and through a series of events find his old D&D books. To figure out where his fantasy urges lay in the real world he sets off for an adventure to discover the fantasy side of people.
This book goes into a modern D&D game session, a reunion of old D&D players, LARPs, Dragon*Con, Society for Creative Anachronism (SCA) areas, Wizardrock (i.e Harry and the Potters), and yes even fantasy video games with the focus on WoW. Through this journey he talks about various reasons of escape as a means to cope with reality, and even going as far as trying to find a proper balance between the fantasy world and the real world.
Now if you have been following these reviews you know a title I have done earlier was Reality is Broken by Jane McGonigal and the various themes of explaining how escapism is used to deal with real world issues on a person hit home in an unscientific manner. Jane uses the escape to allow us to achieve more then what we believe we can in reality with Fantasy Freaks argues that we escape to make reality simpler to manage and easier to control.
Both people are correct for vastly different reasons, I wonder if Fantasy Freaks went ahead and read Reality is Broken if he would agree with Jane's viewpoint or stick with his own.
As for the video game point of view he does talk about being addicted to video games, even talks to a self help survivor of it. Although the addict argues that video games are evil he simply states at the end that he was really into self help tapes, thus indirectly saying that it might not be video games but the addict within a person that latches on to a particular vice and rolls with it.
In the end he came to a realization where he realizes the true meaning of imagination and dreams, it is not to simply live in a fantasy land instead of reality. We escape or use our imagination in order to create. I believe he hit the nail right on the head with this, as imagination allow us to make world or things that we know do not exist and them into a somewhat tangible reality for people to interact with, some people take it to the extreme and actually try to immerse themselves into their fantasy 24 hours a day but as Jane pointed out in her book doing it for more then 3 hours a day is unhealthy for anyone to do.
All in all a book I can highly recommend if you ever dreamed about Harry Potter, Tolkien or even the fantasy genre itself. It gives a great perspective on how to balance the adult life with your inner child and has valuable advice to anyone who has the same issue the author has in this.
April 14, 2011
WRA Episode 21- License to Kill
And we're up with the 21st episode of WRA (OMG, I'm at 21 episodes, this is so awesome!), in which I review the 16th James Bond movie, the first not to even be ostensibly based on the books...
LICENSE TO KILL
LICENSE TO KILL
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)