It's Actually Thirty Pieces If You Count the Jar and Lid

My mind is completely shot right now. Over the last few days, I've been struggling to come up with any sort of way to set this post up. I wanted to tie this in with my summer reading list and links to the books on Amazon. I wanted to tie this in with a short essay on why "Sit Down, Shut Up" was actually a very good show and could have lasted longer than one pseudo-season if they had debuted with any other episode than the one they used. Unfortunately, everything I've written in the last few days has been crap and I've scrapped everything.

So, I'll just come out with this announcement: I've finally listed my Fridge Tetris sets for sale on Etsy. Please feel free to meander over to my Etsy store and stock up. They make a great gift for any occasion, and are sure to make your recipient laugh. (At the very least, I've had a 4/4 track record with that.) Even as I type this, I might be close to making my first sale, so be sure to jump on them quick-like! I'll keep making more sets throughout the summer as well as some sets with variants, so be sure to keep an eye out for those as well. Click on the picture to jump to my store!

State of the Twitter

I've been thinking about writing this post for quite some time, hence the terribly outdated title. It seemed like the topic came up again in a big way this past week, so I figured I should dust it off and try to work something up about it.

I think I mentioned once before how I prefer to use Facebook as a utility rather than a means of life (ah yes, here). Since then, I've also started using Twitter in a similar way. For my Communications Theory class this past semester, I did a nice long research project (although it was technically more of a literature review?) on Web 2.0 applications and their practical usage in modern society. Before you ask, I won't be posting it here, no matter how relevant it is to the topic. The end result was terrible, my grade reflected it, and I honestly wish I could have had another week to get the whole thing together and salvage my grade (and dignity) a bit.

Nonetheless, it was an interesting topic to research. Among the articles I researched, a few talked about the impact social networking sites like Facebook may have had on elections, both here and abroad. A couple more talked about how Twitter is being used in health care, and can be an effective means for emergency response. (Interestingly, a week or two before the assignment was due, XKCD published this comic, which I nearly included in my final project.) On the whole, it was awesome and a bit weird to see how much technology, and in particular, the Internet could be harnessed and manipulated by the average Joe.

I used to be in the camp of people who hated the concept of Twitter, because of all the people who do 140-character ramblings about their mundane activities. This is, of course, a stereotype, but it was rather prevalent back then, and it still somewhat is now. I got a Twitter account because of my Journalism professor, who attended a conference where they mentioned Twitter as a means for receiving and relaying news. He suggested that we do a little experiment and get Twitter accounts, and see whether or not it was practical or not.

I'm fairly certain I was the only one who emerged from that experiment with any sort of positive result. In addition to the professor and a few obligatory classmates, I had other friends who were already on Twitter, and making good use of it for spreading news stories they came across. Often times, I would use these stories that the people I followed posted in my radio show, as the hard-copy newspaper I was using sometimes didn't give enough material to make jokes about. As of the time of writing of this post, I follow 17 people, of whom, about half have posted a tweet on some sort of news story that I would later use on my show. My professor is following only seven people, of whom, only one appears to be using the service actively (two if you count myself). (Worth noting: One person he's following seems to have a profile pic not unlike him, although blurry. This person posts tweets (although infrequently) reflecting the same political views as my professor. Final nail in the coffin, pun unintended: Their background picture is a zombie/horror film pic, which my professor has often professed a love for. Doppelganger much? I've got my suspicions.)

After a month or two of non-tweetliness in class, my professor said he didn't much see the point in Twitter, and has stopped using it since then. I've gotten a lot out of Twitter, so what went wrong here? Is it his fault for not being a little more outgoing and following people who post news? Is it my fault for not retweeting the articles that my friends would post? Perhaps we're both a bit at fault here.

Aside from news-sharing tweets, a few reviewer friends and I have used Twitter for more social exchanges, such as comedic debate and banter. Honestly, I don't tweet often, and when I do, it's usually announcing a new blog post, but occasionally I'll tweet my two cents' worth of humorous thoughts. That's the extent of my Twitter usage, and I'm comfortable with that.

Unfortunately, one of the problems that remains with Twitter is that it still gets a bad rap as a useless site. It's hard for a lot of people to overcome the 140-characters-of-narcissism view of Twitter. (I don't need Twitter for narcissism, I've got a blog for that!) Or, they don't see the point of following celebrities mindlessly gabbing away in a similar manner. The popular opinion, from what I gather, is that people don't like Twitter, and if they once did, then it's "dying out," according to a couple of articles I read in some newspapers (which is sorta ironic, if you think about it). There really is a gem of utilibility (ooh, I should trademark that) in Twitter, but you've got to be putting it to the right uses to be able to find it.

My origins with Facebook started out a little differently from that of Twitter. It wasn't until after my freshman year of college that I decided to sign up. So far as I can remember, I didn't have anything against the service when I first found out about it, I just didn't really see the need to get it until later than most people did. Over the summer of 2007, I started my account, and I used it with the intent of, surprisingly, being social with people.

Over time, my Facebook usage started to diminish, and it took on the "utility" role that I have for Twitter. If I needed to get a hold of someone, Facebook was generally a good way to go about doing it. Someone once commented on how "naked" my Wall was. (I had a fun time continuously posting responses of "(This message has been deleted by Facebook Administration.)", much to her annoyance.) My irritation for Facebook probably started when little things called applications became popular. Day in and day out, I would receive endless requests to join some game or take some quiz or other irritating diversion. I quickly came to love the "block application" button, and to this day, I have probably about 300+ applications on my block list. (Sidenote: If you hate seeing all the messages in your newsfeed about other friends' application usage, be sure to check out FB Purity, a very nice script that blocks those sorts of messages out.)

It seems as though Facebook has changed over the last few months though. Part of this might be due to the fact that the majority of my peers, students who graduated last week as Music Education majors, seemingly collectively changed their last names to their middle names to avoid being found in searches. It's not necessarily that there's anything bad in their profiles that they want to keep hidden, it's just that they'd prefer not to have students or employers looking up their pages. All of these years of professors stalking profiles to yell at students for what they have on their pages seems to have finally paid off, apparently.

This does bring up a huge question of privacy, and what people you haven't approved can or can't see on your profile. I think I've gotten my profile on a tight enough lockdown that nothing aside from my name, gender, school, and location are visible to non-friend humans, although I've yet to test this out. However, there's also the numerous problems with non-humans and how much information they can see of your profile. A bot flipping through profiles and farming information would probably be no more effective than a human doing the same thing, so the major information loss occurs when Facebook wants to make a little money.

Perhaps this is an overly-paranoid statement, but I've come to believe that at this point, Facebook now exists first with the intention of making a buck, and providing a platform for social networking second. Part of this sneaking suspicion(!) comes from the ever-changing privacy statements, which seem to grow in length and become more vague and legalese at time goes on, despite Facebook's best efforts to "keep the peoples' best interest in mind." Part of this suspicion comes from how Facebook seems to want to barge into other aspects of my life, and Facebook seems to be willing to shell out my personal information to do so.

Part of this suspicion comes from an instance I had a couple weeks ago, when I checked my actual profile page for the first time in a few days. I was greeted with a Facebookian dialogue box asking me to link my interests to their respective "pages". "Hm, what," I asked. Apparently, the "interests" I put in my profile page are no longer to be read as a normal paragraph explaining my interests, favorite books, TV shows, etc., but are now to be attached directly to the pages they correspond to. As I mentioned before, I use Facebook strictly as a utility, so I have avoided joining any fan pages up until now. Thus, I declined joining any of the fan pages. Little did I know that this would actually delete all of my interests from my profile, leaving me with absolutely no personal information about myself other than my gender and school. Clearly, the Facebook I once knew for sharing information with my friends instead of the whole world is gone. This, among many other reasons which I have mentioned above and will continue to mention below, are catalysts for me to leave Facebook. I'd rather people not look me up by what I enjoy, but rather, who I am.

Thus, in the last couple of weeks, Facebook and I have been on slightly uneasy terms. Apparently, I've not been alone in this. I started seeing news stories popping up on how Facebook might be violating its own privacy policy by selling information to advertisers. Facebook's privacy policy is apparently now longer than the US Constitution (which, frankly, isn't terribly long, but it says something when you have to deal with more legalese to be a member of a website than to run an entire country). A friend of mine has actually decided to leave Facebook entirely, citing a number of links showing how corrupt Facebook really is. I'm very much not alone in thinking Facebook's no longer a good site. (link, link, link, although I might argue with some of the points in the last one.)

Despite its corruption, I still plan to keep using my Facebook account, for the time being at least, because it's still a decent tool for contacting friends. Aside from photos (from which it'd be hard for advertisers to get any personal information about me), my profile is nearly bare, save for a few essential bits of information.

This really is a shame, because I have seen the potential benefits of Web 2.0 sites such as Twitter and YouTube, but Facebook really seems to have gone down a dark path. Do I still think there's hope for the expansion of practical applications of Web 2.0? Possibly, but the faults that Facebook has committed really makes one lose confidence in the system. When you're invited in as a human but treated as a piece of meat, it's hard to enjoy a decent burger later.

I Swear, I Wasn't a Music Major in a Past Life

In case you missed my last posting, here's a sliver of what you missed:

Excellent.

Speaking of Steam (crap, that was a hint, wasn't it?), I spotted a new music game in the store the other day. It's called Beat Hazard, and to quote the game's description, it's "A new experience in gameplay mechanics... Gameplay Powered by YOUR Music!" Huzzah, we've never experienced such a unique concept befo-- Oh wait.

Okay, in fairness, it's not the same thing as Audiosurf. While Audiosurf is a Guitar Hero-esque reflexy music game, Beat Hazard is a Asteroids-esque shmupy music game. You play as a spaceship that moves around with the arrow keys/WASD, and goes pew pew with the mouse. You shoot things that are flying around, you collect powerups, you get points, you try not to die. Not that complex of a game, and at that, not too original.

Theoretically, the main selling point is that your music (sorry, YOUR music) is what changes the actual gameplay experience. As the music gets more "intense", you get swarmed by more or more powerful enemies. Similarly, you can pick up powerups that make the music louder (more intense!) which gives you stronger bullets. Or perhaps the music itself makes the bullets stronger. Or something like that, I'm not quite sure, frankly. (Now would be a good time to mention that like so many games I review, I really can't afford to buy full versions all the time, so I'm working off a demo that limits you to only ten games.)



Sketchy memories of the exact rules aside, the graphics are nice and bright, although flashy to the point of seizure-inducing (as early as the title screen). One problem is that as more enemies flood the screen, it's hard to tell the active enemies, the dead wreckage, the volatile shards of space junk, the visualizer-esque background, and even your own ship apart. I tried to grab a screenshot to give you a taste, but, well, all I could really get was a black screengrab, so there's a bunny for ya. Also, I didn't want to steal the snapshots posted on Steam, because not only are they less than impressive, but they also have captions written right on them that make looking through them feel like reading through an overly-eager father's photo album of a family vacation. ("I love pwning those bad guys to heavy rock!" Yeah, that bad.)

As I mentioned before, the gameplay is kinda lacking any fresh bells or whistles. Move with one hand, fire with the other, and blow stuff up. Quieter/calmer music seems to give you more non-combative debris-like obstacles to shoot (think "Asteroids"), louder/more active music seems to give you enemies in small salvos that fly around and fire back at you (think... Oh dear, I don't know about that many shmups... I'm just gonna throw in Rapture Capture because it's one of the few shmups that I've ever really enjoyed). But there's very little evidence that the music actually corresponds to the game being produced. Sure, it can pick out little spikes of sound in the waveform, but is that really it? To a certain extent, it almost seems like it's just a standard shooter with a really flashy visualizer in the background. If you need a little bit more of an elaboration on this thought, consider the boss battles which seem to appear more at certain time intervals instead of in conjunction with the music, and the visualizer itself which sometimes looks as though it's pumping out beats at a different tempo from the one in the music being played.

In order to remedy this rash of people claiming that the difficulty of the game is determined by the music that's playing, I'd like to propose a system for analyzing this fluctuating corelation. Each game would be rated by a few different criteria, each getting a score from one to ten, indicated by the box above (black out colored bars for scores less than ten, and put the name of the specific criteria in the bottom half of the box... and yes, it did take me two minutes to whip that up in Paint, thank you very much).

The tricky bit in devising such a system is coming up with the actual criteria to grade on. Two obvious ones would be "How well does the game reflect the dynamics/volume of the music?" and "How well does the game reflect the rhythm/tempo of the music?". Frankly, almost any game with a decent music analysis system should be able to look at the basic waveform and pull out those two things. The volume factor comes from the amplitude of the waves, the rhythm (mostly) comes from the wavelengths, or the clusters of waves that make up each sound (drum hits, instruments playing notes, syllables of lyrics, etc.). These are physical characteristics of sound, or at least, physical in the sense that they are observable and recordable.

Honestly, those two criteria could be enough to rank songs with, although it'd be a very bare-bones rating. It'd be nice if there was at least a third criteria, possibly to explore the corelation between the general mood of the music or the instruments used and the shape of the gameplay. Actual "intensity" is so hard to analyze in a song, unless you're actually hearing it and experiencing it.

What I'd like to ask is your opinions on what could be used as criteria for judging the relationship between music and gameplay that is theoretically based on it. Any ideas? I sorta like the criteria of volume-matching and tempo-matching, but what else is out there?

Random Thoughts on the Town Formerly Known As Sue Nork Yitty

1. New York is an amazingly organized city.
I think that every time I've been to New York City in the past, my views have been influenced by what I've seen on TV. Every street is caught in a perpetual traffic jam, it takes forever to get to the other side of town, and you'd be better off walking everywhere. Granted, in every other trip to NYC in the past, I was in a coach bus that didn't jive well with the busy streets, and likely ended up causing half of the traffic jams. When you really back up and look at the streets of NYC as a total pedestrian, traffic lights and regulations are set up to really make for smooth sailing most of the time. Even in busy Times Square, things run rather smoothly (pending the absence of crazy coach bus drivers who block off streets to let kids out to see a musical).

2. Tourists carry cameras, travelers do not.
Technically speaking, these "tourists" and "travelers" are really the same thing, but there's such a strong negative connotation to being a tourist, especially in a big city like this. I used to be a tourist, in fact, taking pictures of anything and everything. I now see how annoying this is to everyone else who just wants to get from point A to point B as quickly as possible. Tourists like to stand in inconvenient places to take their pictures, such as right on the corner, where mobile pedestrians are actually trying to cross streets, but instead have to dodge stationary pedestrians that are in the way.

I did not take a single picture during this entire trip, despite having my camera on me at all times. I came to realize that half of the pictures I would take pictures of (or most tourists, for that matter) have already been taken and posted on the Internet. If the tourists themselves didn't take them, someone who works at the particular facility in question posted it on their website. This really belongs in a rant all by itself, but it seems like we don't need to travel or take pictures anymore, we could just surf around Flickr accounts and Google Images and get exactly what we need. I honestly returned home with the intention of, if necessary, just doing a quick search for a photo of someplace I went to in order to describe it. This might be part of where my bitterness for tourists and tourism comes from.

That much said and done, once you get rid of the cameras, it's truly impossible to tell a visiting traveler from a New York City resident. Or at least, this opinion comes from a visiting traveler who really can't tell the difference if there is one. Maybe there are some certain dress codes that travelers and tourists use that residents don't, but beyond that, there's very little way to tell one person from another. New York City is enough of a cultural mixing pot such that you can't pick out any ethnicity as local or not. Everyone has the chance to be a local.

Of course, I had to get a little creative...





3. Subways are pretty much the most awesome thing ever.
Confession: I have a mild obsession with public transportation. I'm quite comfortable sitting and looking out the window for long periods of time in the company of strangers. I loved the El in Chicago, and I love the Subway in NYC. I get a really strange kick out of seeing an underground world fly by me from the comfort of my cozy little cabin. The best way I can describe it is like those chase scenes in action films where more of the rush comes from the speed of movement rather than the pursuit itself. That's really a crappy decision... I just like subways. Shut up. Leave me be.

4. Pizza is pizza.
I'd hate to say it, but of the three or four different pizza establishments I ate at over the course of the weekend, I noticed no difference in taste. I'm sorry. I'm sure each of these independently-owned pizza joints have their own claims to fame, but pizza is pizza. There's really little deviation there.

5. It is completely feasible to live in New York City.
Again, most of my assumptions about NYC were formed by media stereotypes and faulty high school experiences. Now that I've seen more of the island on my own and have seen residential areas as well as the big tourist district, I feel that life in a big city such as NYC is completely possible. The only downside is the cost of living there, between high rent and costs for everyday items. Granted, mid-town Manhattan isn't the best representation of prices everywhere, but even as you get away from the middle of the city, prices still do loom higher. But cost aside though, it seems like anyone could function just as they normally would in their hometown. The only thing that changes is the size of everything. And the presense of tourists.

You've Won the Home Version of Our Game!

Spring break! And instead of running around on the beach, I'm blogging. Meh, it's a small price to pay for not having an attractive body. nearby beaches that MTV would care to tape at. a life. Sometimes I truly wonder what majors all these kids have that allows them the genuine free time to go to beaches, get plastered and knocked up, and have MTV cameras show it all. I've got some 150-some pages of journal articles to read for a research paper over break, and I've somehow managed to find time to slip in a blog post about gaming. You kids can keep your STD's, I'm fine here, thanks.

Before I get to the actual blog post at hand, I wanted to throw out a question that some of you might have more knowledge than myself on. A few posts back, I discussed the idea of Fridge Tetris, a little set of magnets for geeky fun on your fridge. I've started making a couple of batches for a couple certain someones, and I'm noticing that I've got quite a lot of beads sorted and ready to go for more production. My question is, would it be possible to sell Fridge Tetris for a profit, or would copyright/legal issues prevent me from legally doing so? If I were to give the same product a different name (one that doesn't use the T-word), would it be legal? I don't plan on going huge with this, maybe just a small etsy.com store or something like that. Any input on the matter would be greatly appreciated, please comment below.

Right then, on to reviews proper. Amazingly, all three of these games caught my eye(s) because of the fact that they're based on game shows. It's been an awfully long time since I've written anything on game shows, hasn't it? First off, and this is only slightly cheating, I'd like to draw your attention to the deviously difficult Only Connect online game, featuring some of the Connecting Walls from the first season of the show. Only Connect is one of those UK game shows that I wish we could have in America, except it's way too cerebral for anyone to give a crap and actually watch it. We like our quick thrills with game shows here in America, we've got no tolerance for the sit-and-think shows. Anywho, the Connecting Walls are quite a fun (although painful) treat, and worth a go if you're a fan of lateral thinking puzzles. Also be sure to check out the Jay is Games review for more discussion.

Second up, and with a bit more proper discussion this time, is the Press Your Luck game by Ludia. You're probably familiar enough with this "cult classic" that I don't have to explain it in great detail to you. (By the way, what does that even mean, "cult classic"? I don't get what makes something in pop culture "cult" or not. Firefly, Mystery Science Theatre 3000, and Press Your Luck all seem to be clustered under the "cult" definition, yet I see really little linking them. DISCUSS!)



In this version, much like the show, you get two question rounds and two spin rounds. Rather than fiddling with the incredibly testy input-your-answer-by-keyboard method, you can buzz in first and choose from four possible choices for three spins, or wait until someone else picks first then choose from the three remaining choices for one spin. Full disclosure: Both this review and the next are made on hour-long demos, so I can't get very far into these games to make accurate judgements. I throw in this warning because at least in the very early stages, the AI is incredibly slow to buzz in, so you're almost definitely guaranteed to hear the full question and still buzz in for three spins. Perhaps this gets a little better as you unlock the twenty "games" as you go along, where you face off against (what I'm assuming are) more difficult sets of opponents. Oddly, each pair of contestants you face against has a little mini-story behind them, almost to justify the difficulty curve. The first two contestants you face off against both "could use a little more sleep", ie, they're slow on the buzzer.



I'm actually a bit surprised to say that this version pays close attention to some of the finer details about this show. While the music isn't exactly the same and sound effects might be slightly different, a lot of the set design and graphics feel right at home compared to the original show. If there's any major difference to be noted, it's the questions used for determining spins. While the original show had questions that seemed to cover a lot of topics, most of the questions on this version are about TV and movies. Namely, you'll see a lot of questions in the form of "What character did [celebrity name] play in [movie title]?" This may or may not account for some of the character bios as well, for example, the pair of sports fans who might not be up on this sort of trivia. (*shrug) I'd rather have a wide range of questions, but then again, I'm really not up on movie trivia.



One other difference (or similarity?) that needs to be mentioned is the "randomness" of the big board itself. It didn't take me very long before I realized that the bouncing lights on the big board were in fact random (unlike the pre-made patterns used early in the show's run), but the boards themselves were not. In fact, there seems to be three boards for each round, and one of them contains no Whammies at all (see above). Once you figure out how this works, you'll likely find yourself watching one signal square to know exactly when to stop and never hit any Whammies. You'd think that they'd do a little more to prevent this (after the whole Michael Larson fiasco and all), but apparently they're not concerned about people cheating. You know, cheating that's as easy as pie, intravenously injected into one's body: not nearly as delicious, but it's still pie.

Right, so there's a good amount that "isn't quite right" here, especially if you're a purist fan of the show (hm, cult makes sense all of a sudden...). The music is different. Only one of the Whammy animations was ever seen on the original show. The only "prizes" on the board are trips, all with the same value. There's no flokati rug. Those aren't Peter Tomarken's and Rod Roddy's voices. What do you want from them, man? They're both dead! If you're one of those game show fans that is seriously distraught by differences from the original formats, stay away from this game. Otherwise, you might find this game to be a quite enjoyable tribute to that show you always watched reruns of on the USA Network as a kid. In either case, as an alternative, I have to give mention to a freeware version I found online years ago. While the original developer seems to have yanked his homepage, it's found on some freeware download sites (like here). It lacks the question round altogether and Whammy animations (although there are plenty of audio files from the original show), but it's still very well-made, easily customizable with the included tools, quite a bit of fun, and FERE. Sorry, free. My typing seems to be off today.

The final game in this "home version" round-up is The Price is Right 2010 Edition, also by Ludia. Sadly, my review on this game is going to be extremely short, because there's very little to say here, especially if you bought the last version of the game (which I believe also came out on Wii and maybe some other platforms).



If you've not played either version, let me run down the fast details: You can play either alone or as a group, earning the right to play on stage with the Item Up For Bids (hereafter referred to as "IUFB"), playing pricing games, spinning the Big Wheel, and trying to win it all in the Showcase. If you're playing solo, you can play with either the 3 Strikes mode, where you play until you accumulate three losses (but only from the IUFB's and Big Wheel, oddly enough), or Classic mode, where you play through a typical "show" of sorts, where you play everything in the order and conditions given by the show (you have to win an IUFB to play a pricing game, you have to win the Showcase Showdown to go to the Showcase). In any case, it's pretty much the same as the show you watched everyday during the summer and when you were home sick from school.



The big problem is that there really isn't anything new here to see. Ludia seems to have just regurgitated the last version of the show, but with the newer set design and a change in the characters you can play as (which I completely forgot to mention during the PYL review, but it's the exact same thing here, so it's no big deal). If you jumped to buy the last version, you'd be better off continuing to play that one than to buy this one as well. I'm not even joking when I say that almost nothing has changed about the IUFB's, the pricing games, the prizes a/o prize footage, or the showcases. In fact, I'm pretty sure that the first IUFB I bid for with the 2010 version on this computer (my netbook), my desktop, and my desktop with the older version (2008 or 2009?) was the exact same garden shed.

I apologize for keeping this review so short in comparison to the Press Your Luck review, but there's very little I can say about a rip-off of one's own product. If you like the show, by all means, give this a shot, but don't buy both versions, they're nearly identical. It's a shame because I'm sure host Drew Carey would have loved to have been involved in the production of this new version, but it looks like no effort was made to actually improve the game itself from its last incarnation. If you're still looking for more information, I'd recommend this video review for the old Wii version, it coincides with most of my opinions (just, you know, on PC), or check out the Jay is Games review.

On a wholly unsatisfactory and unrelated closing note, this is the first time I've tried throwing in alt-texts with the graphics. Do they seem to be working? I'm not sure if I did the code right or not, and the "Preview" function on Blogger doesn't seem to show the alt-texts at all.