Diablo III

Jeremy, a buddy of mine, asked me what I thought of Diablo III now that I've beaten it on Normal mode. I gave him a mixed answer. This is why.

In my youth, I played the hell (literally!) out of Diablo and Diablo II. The premise is simple: you have a dude, he gets stronger over time, you click on bad guys who explode with loot, you take that loot, you get stronger, you keep clicking, you get better loot, you beat the game. It's pretty fun.

Thing is, that's about it. It's a simple formula--so simple, in fact, that it's kind of hard to one-up it without breaking genre. Because of that, I was looking forward (for a whole dozen years) to the third entry in the series. I even preordered it, which I have not done for a videogame in a very, very long time.

Now, going into it, I knew that there would be a few things that I wasn't a fan of. The first was always-on DRM, which means that while you are in the game, you are constantly connected to a server run by Blizzard. For a gamer like me, who digs the single player and doesn't think that a multiplayer option is a big enough feature to sell a game on, this was puzzling. So, even if I just wanted to play solo, no multiplayer at all, I'd still have to be connected to Blizzard's servers? Yep. This makes sense (from Blizzard's POV) for a number of reasons: anti-piracy, anti-cheating, and drop-in-drop-out multiplayer.

There's ample discussion online about whether DRM can ever be a good thing, as it always gets bypassed and in the case of the worst offenders (EA, looking at you!) it can seriously hamper your ability to play the game. As it turned out, come launch night, the DRM broke the game for just about everyone ever in the world (who was playing it).

For the millions of players who tried to login to their single player game (I cringe as I type that), they were met with this error. For hours. In my case, I couldn't get in for 90 minutes. When I, and others, did, we had to battle a host of other errors, like 3007, which meant that you couldn't make a character. Granted, I wasn't one of those who took that next day off of work to play (hello, end of the semester!), but my brother and one of my goodest friends were. That totally sucked for them.

Connectivity problems continued intermittently all that night and well into the next day. It got so bad Blizzard had to pull the game down to fix the servers for ~4 hours. This meant that because Blizzard royally screwed up in not having even close the amount of servers they would need to allow all of their players to play (a fact that is even more bewildering when you realize that Blizzard had EXACT NUMBERS of people who pre-ordered and had downloaded and installed the game in advance of launch), everyone who shelled out $60 for a brand-new videogame was royally hosed. They--we--couldn't even play single player, on our own damn computers, during that time.

Now, you might say, oh yeah, well that was like a one-time thing, right? It's all fixed now, yes? For now, yes it appears so. But what's going to happen 5, 10, 15 years down the road? Who's to say Blizzard won't just pull the plug on their Diablo III servers? That's already happened to a number of MMOs like Star Wars Galaxy Online: here one day, gone the next, with no recourse. Now, if you're playing an online game, server longevity and the game publisher's committment to the players are a risk I suppose you have to take. For a game that can be played in the single-player, however? That's unconscionable.

Furthermore, This Is Only The Beginning. Diablo III is the first big-ticket game by a major publisher to have this inane always-on DRM for single-player. Because it was the quickest-selling videogame in the history of videogames however, people that make games are going to say this: Well hey, it worked for DIablo III, the precident's been set, now no one's going to care if we slap that same kind of nonsense onto our game! And then we all die.

My other major problem? All this game adds to the genre, besides shitty DRM, is 1) the real-money auction house, where people can buy and sell items in-game for--you guessed it--real money, and 2) it's pretty. Very, very pretty.

The Real-Money Auction House: you better believe I'm not going to spend any of my real money there. Why? Because it's totally worthless. I already spent $60 on the game, I'm not going spend more on a few lines of code with an accompaning picture that will make my guy temporarily more badass. It's like buying Farmville credits: a wholly, terribly stupid idea.

Prettiness: yeah, the game's gorgeous. Of course, I can't even play it on the highest resolution (thanks, budget graphics card!), but even then--it's very pretty. Except, of course, when the server barfs and I lag all over the place and textures get dropped and all of a sudden I'm dead. Then it's not very pretty at all.

Like I said before in the intro, you can't really improve on the gameplay. Yes, I love that there's 5 classes with all kinds of neat skills, but that's not improvement, that's just expansion. It's not like adding a new race to Starcraft or anything.

The story? Nonsense drivel that is especially nonsensical and drively after you beat it and play it again on a harder mode, since the guys you've rescued are already rescued yet poof! there they are again needing to be rescued. The sorry excuse for a plot is nothing more than a device to get you from one pretty-looking place to another, with boss fights inbetween. And with the drop-in-drop-out multiplayer, there's a damn good chance you're going to miss out on a bunch of "story" because your storyline progression automatically jumps to where the party leader is at. Not that I'm on my second playthrough, I realized I missed quite a big part of what passes for narrative. Worst part: I didn't even notice the first time through.

Now, after all that dourness and naysaying, I'll end this review with the following: it's still a super fun game. If you've never played anything like it though, I suggest you go pick up a super-cheap copy of Diablo II or Torchlight or something (both of which can be found for <$15 I'm sure) to get a feel. And then once you get in, look me up (thunderchao#1655) and I'll hop in your game.

UPDATE: The fine fellows at RPS seem to feel the same way as I do (and because I actually wrote this last night but told it to not publish until today, it's legit):

John: See, I think I’m being miscast. I have repeatedly said that it’s good. Just that it’s not good enough to merit being so crippled, and it’s a big disappointment that it fails to make a single innovation.

Alec: I’d argue it makes plenty of innovations, they’re just not the innovations you wanted. Or I wanted either, frankly – the persistent auction house and the long road of crafting make me feel tired even to think about them.

John: Really, in what way does it move the aRPG forward?

Jim: The innovations it makes aren’t interesting, perhaps. They’re functional, commercial, but not things that raise eyebrows.

Alec: it’s very much about builds, played and monitored on a very high level that I know I am unlikely to have the stamina to stick with. And it’s very carefully designed to be an infinite experience rather than one bludgeoned through a couple of times then left alone. As in, it’s an MMO in every respect except the actual levels

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Tin Foil Hats for Fun and Profit!

Okay so today I came across this epic reddit thread: What 'fan theories' have blown your mind with their devastating logic? Besides the awesomeness of that title, there were quite a few good-slash-amusing ones in there.

Here are my favorites, and oh--spoilers abound:

• zaphod_85 on Dr Claw as the original Inspector Gadget
  • I really love the theory that in Inspector Gadget, the Inspector we know is actually the second Inspector, built as a completely-robotic replacement after the first was lost in action. He was loaded with his old memories, and nobody would have been the wiser, except that the original Inspector Gadget didn't actually die.
  • Upon returning from whatever disaster caused his bosses to give up on him as KIA, and now horribly disfigured, he discovers this replacement living his life, even with his dog and raising his niece. The original Inspector snaps, and vows to devote the rest of his life to the destruction of the ungodly replacement. He disavows everything he once knew and loved, even going so far as to take a new name... DOCTOR CLAW!!
• Ramb0command0 on the setting of 'Aladdin' (from 4chan)
  • In one scene, Genie calls Al’s clothes “so 3rd century”. Genie was trapped for 10,000 years, so there is no way he could know of the fashion trends which have happened whilst he was in the lamp, which means at the latest Genie could have been trapped in the lamp during the 3rd century. If he spent 10,000 years in there, it is then AT LEAST the year 10,300AD when he gets out.
  • Conclusion: Aladdin takes place IN THE FUTURE. A post-apocalyptic world where only Arabic (and some Greek) culture survived. It has been so long that the name “Arabia” has been corrupted to “Agrabah”. The Islamic religion has atrophied to the point where there are no mosques, imams or prayer mats, but people still give praise to Allah in moments of happiness. Amazing technological marvels left behind by the previous civilization, like flying carpets or genetically engineered parrots which can comprehend human speech instead of just mimicking it, are taken for granted by locals or considered “Magic”. The Genie proves this by making impressions of ancient, long-dead celebrities like Groucho Marx, Jack Nicholson, etc.

butterflypoon on Samurai Jack/Powerpuff Girls

• Samurai Jack takes place in post-apocalyptic Townsville. (Powerpuff Girls)
• ALSO, CountGrasshopper supplied this image as evidence.

colosis1414's copypasta of Chell (Portal) in Purgatory

• So, has anyone thought about how Portal is a giant allusion to Purgatory?
• There is (seemingly) no reason to be putting Chell through these horrible experiments other than for GLaDOS' sadistic pleasure.
• But what if it's REALLY a test?
• Not a scientific test, but a test of character and determination as to redeem oneself? Perhaps GLaDOS' taunts of "All your other friends couldn't come either, because you don't have any other friends because of how unlikable you are. It says so right here in your personnel file; 'Unlikable. Liked by no one. A bitter, unlikable loner whose passing shall not be mourned.'.... It also says you were adopted. So that's funny too." isn't just pointless mocking, but a reminder of Chell's former life?
• It's also heavily implied that GLaDOS could possibly be much more knowing, being as some kind of tester for Purgatory, with quotes like "Speaking of curiosity, you're curious about what happens after you die, right? Guess what? I know."
• Quotes like this have a much more significant meaning when thought of in this context.
• "I feel sorry for you, really, because you're not even in the right place." "This is your fault. It didn't have to be like this." "You're not a good person, you know that, right? Good people don't end up here."

Others linked to other fan theories, including one of my favorites, Chewbacca and R2D2 as the Greatest Rebel Spies Ever, which I had read a few years ago; Jonathan Last's piece on why the Empire was the good guys; and one from Final Fantasy VIII, namely that Squall's Dead. 

Still others referenced whole bodies of fan theories. Theories about Pokemon have an entire subreddit to themselves (KANTO WAR!, another of my personal favorites), and theories about one of the greatest fantasy series ever--A Song of Fire and Ice (you might also know it as Game of Thrones)--can be found at the ASOIAF subreddit. Be warned though, if you haven't read the books, you might want to steer clear of that last link lest your face be melted off my all the spoilers.

This kind of thing is fascinating to me and I love it. Bring it on.

Posted via email from BLOG.NATHANIELRAY

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The Ages of the Internet

A lot of fuss and hot air has been respectively raised and blown about over the past few years about 'Web 2.0' like we had entered a new era of the internet. While I think that term is stupid, it is useful, and after thinking about the issue some, here are my thoughts on the matter. All the dates are generalized, all the evidence anecdotal (except where it's not)

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Horse Race Politics

I just finished reading a wonderful and hilarious and enraging and oh-so-right article on Cracked. Here is the very end:

I'm telling you from experience, watching political races [like a sports fan rooting for his favorite team] is addictive as shit. You have thousands of years of violent tribal instincts pumping through your veins, itching for a fight. That makes you an easy tool for manipulation, and every good politician and pundit knows how to push those buttons to make people march neatly in formation.

Don't succumb. Or else you'll start supporting the most bullshit legislation just because your guy is for it. Or you'll start knee-jerk rejecting anything the other "team" proposes. Not because it's bad for the country, but because you want to deny them a "win."

It's a poisonous way of thinking. It will lower your IQ, it will rot your ability to think critically about the subjects that really matter. It's bad for you, it's bad for democracy, it's bad for the world. You have to be better and smarter than the person they think you are. Or else we're all fucked.

The article before those last 3 paragraphs goes on to talk about the problem with trying to follow politics. Namely, the issue is that no one is bothering to tell you what the issues actually are. Rather than reporting on what bearing proposed legislation and ruling might have on real people, the media is hyperfocused on chalking up imaginary points on a CNN/Fox News chalkboard (now 100% digital with extra-large touchscreen!) and riling up their fanbases. Every "gaffe," headline with a question mark, "blast," crazy quote from a nebulous "lawmaker" or "adviser," and "blow to" serve only to dish out more sensationalism and drama for some political team. Honestly I'm surprised that no one's made "Team Donkey" and "Team Elephant" shirts yet.

In some ways, this is a reflection of how Democrat and Republican politicians themselves are represented/act. Now, we could go and try to blame it all on Nixon, Gingritch, and Norquist like this excellent and level-headed article which I encourage you all to read even if you are Republican, but it's not entirely their fault; often, they can't control their representation in the media. The problem for the media, however, is that 1) they've stopped doing actual journalism and may have even forgotten how it's done at all and 2) sensationalism sells. Why try to educate your viewers, readers, or listeners when you'll get more of them by shouting loudly and making fun of people on the other team?

For the person who's actually concerned about all the crazy stuff actually going on with real bills and court decisions, it's terribly hard to find actual news. And that's a sad thing. It's out there, though, you've just got to find it.

Posted via email from BLOG.NATHANIELRAY

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We Haven't Even Started

You may have noticed, should you have your ear to the tech-community ground, that the controversial CISPA bill was passed by the House in a rush job that included a few amendments to the bill that actually make it even more egregious. I'll leave it to Tech Dirt to explain the ins and outs for you (you should check that article real quick if you're in the dark about this).

So after the internet got its panties in a twist over PIPA and SOPA, being in my reading of the situation instrumental in the stoppage of both those bills, and the continuing and growing backlash against these bills' European equivalent ACTA, along comes CISPA and I could feel the internet let out a sigh. "What the hell?" they shout. "We just did this, now you're making us stand up for ourselves and our rights again?" Mark Rogers, who sponsored the bill, and the business interests that support him were dastardly with their timing, and I mean that in both the melodramatic sense of the word (I can just imagine some Koch-brother-type doing the 21st century Republican version of twirling his mustache while mwahahaing to himself) and in the deadly serious sense.

Why deadly serious? Because the struggle for rights is always deadly, whether you're fighting to get them or to keep them. And when the rights under fire are the cornerstones of the entire American idea--freedom of speech and the right to privacy--people are going to be fueled by an overwhelming sense of betrayal: we the people, in order to form a more perfect union, elected representatives into government to protect our rights and speak for us, who in turn take every measure to disenfranchise, monitor, oppress, and subjugate us while protifing wildly from it.

It is the most disgusting scenario imaginable for our American context.

As such, I do not hesitate to name people like Mark Rogers, the Koch brothers, Ben Bernanke, Larry Summers, Lamar Smith (the SOPA guy), Patrick Leahy (the PIPA guy), Nixon, Reagan, the Bushes, and Obama as traitors. Traitors. That's a heavy word, and one with serious consequences and reprecussions. Now, the four presidents might get off a little easier because in all honesty, to some extent I think they have no idea what they're doing while in office.

Traditionally, traitors get publicly executed for their crimes, shamed forever in the annals off history. These days, they get bonuses, tax breaks, golden parachutes, and at the very most, slaps on the wrist.

That's got to change. And we have to change it.

How? I propose a three-pronged approach.

1. Through the courts. Challenge silly laws and rulings like in the Citizens United case. Engage in jury nullifaction on a widespread basis. Never stop the class-action law suits against Goldman Sachs and other similar corporations, congressmen, senators, presidents and their advisors, the Federal Reserve, etc. If the courts are ruling in the favor of special interest groups, or have clearly been proven wrong like with Citizens United, then it is up to us to flood the justice system with our challenges to their rulings at every turn. (Don't worry, your murderers and kidnappers and rapists will still have their time on the docket, so shut up with that argument.)
2. Through the vote, or better put, through the No Vote. While the Constitution doesn't provide for official votes-of-no-confidence for the entire government (and why not? Oh, because the Constitution is extremely limited and terribly broken, sorry to break it to ya), we do have a few roads of recourse. In many states there are protocols for initiative, referendum, and recall where the people can overturn their government when it messes up. We can abstain from voting altogether--think, what kind of message would we be sending to congress, the president, and the world that we absolutely do not support any of them if voter turnout this November is below 20%? We can vote to oust those politicians who seem to be bought and paid for by lobbyists and corporate interests (although they seem to constitute a vast majority...). 
3. Through popular revolt. This is the last and most resonant option, that we can descend on DC and literally block the government from doing its job, and block them until we get the change we're fighting for. Our internet petitions are meaningless (if the official White House petition to put the legalization of marijuana to a vote was casually dismissed by a low-lever staffer despite 700,000+ signatures, we know that nothing of a greater political weight will ever even be considered through that medium). Organizations such as MoveOn.org solicit your donations but in turn do nothing but get rich and feel good about themselves. We need to rise up; it is our responsibility, our calling as citizens. We are beginning to, with the Occupy movement getting the ball rolling, and should the unresponsive and oppressive government continue to push us towards that critical mass, the revolt will come sooner rather than later.

You may be asking yourself, "How did we get from CISPA, a bill ostensibly about stopping online pirates, to overthrowing the government?" Here's the answer: CISPA is symptomatic of the concerted efforts of very rich, very powerful people with massive political leverage to remain rich and powerful. CISPA essentially nullifies the 4th Amendment on the internet (you know, the one that guarantees privacy and personal property and prevents unreasonable arrests and warrantless searches and seizures). We've already seen the 1st (both speech and assembly) trampled on by the police and the media with the Occupy movement; the 6th and 8th (speedy trial by jury and no cruel and unusual punishment) with Bradley Manning/Wikileaks; and the 10th (powers ot the states and people) with making corporations people. There's 5 of our fundamental, guaranteed rights that are part of the Constitution of the United States of America that have been rendered meaningless. Half of the original set. And that's all been within the last two years.

This country is broken, and it's being pushed even further. I haven't even talked about the growing income disparity or the economy or unchecked corporate consolidation or the problem of the Federal Reserve or the TSA or a host of any other things that are breaking us, pushing us further and further into a corner.

Sooner or later, we're going to snap, and it's not going to be pretty. If our voices continue to be denied and our persons continue to be surveilled and abused, then the fallout is going to be all the more worse.

So go call your congressmen, it never hurts. Get yourself educated on the issues, it never hurts (except your soul). Find an outlet and kindred spirits. But most importantly, get ready to fight, because big and scary things are going to be happening all around you very, very soon. If you think it's already pretty bad, and if you think that the people have had the wind taken out of us, just remember: we haven't even started.

Posted via email from BLOG.NATHANIELRAY

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To-Do List for the Last Day of Things before Spring Break and then for Spring Break too

Tomorrow:

1. Go back over some Turkish poetry
2. Make a Russian lesson for Thursday
3. Buy comic books
4. Enjoy the great weather

After that:

1. Read some Ukrainian stories
   1. A short one by Коцюбинський
   2. The first few pages of Андрухович's Московіада
2. Finish reading a book manuscript
3. Play lots of D&D
4. Write the synthetic essay for my MA portfolio
5. Ride lots of bikes
6. Enjoy the great weather

Posted via email from BLOG.NATHANIELRAY

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Books of Inordinate Length

I very much enjoy reading. Especially fiction. It provides a unique kind of escape and fantasy, substantially different from film or theater, one that both requires and rewards imagination. Good authors paint beautiful pictures in your head with their words so that the world and characters and history and feel of the story become visible, tangible even. When an author creates a compelling world, I am reluctant to leave it. Even as I rush headlong through the pages, I try to soak up every word, pausing to mull over a curious phrase or a particularly striking image. Particularly, I enjoy the long ones, especially if there's a whole long series of long books that hold my attention. Why is this? The easiest answer is because I don't want it to end. There's got to be an x-factor, some excellent quality that pulls me back in not only for each book, but for revisiting the series as a whole at a later date. Now, I think there's an even deeper reason there too, but I'll get there at the end. First I want to talk about my favorites.

I've just wrapped up the fifth book in the George RR Martin series A Song of Ice and Fire. The last few books have indeed been over the magic 1000 page mark. For me, this is the arbitrary magic number, because if a book crests a thousand, I know for a fact that the author (at the very least) is batting for the fences: there's an epic quality, so much to the story that only 3 digits worth of pages cannot contain. This thrills me. The last books of ASOIAF can't come swiftly enough--but first they have to be written, and I'm pretty certain we're going to be getting at least 2000 more pages from Martin. Stoked.

An obvious mention here is Harry Potter. Now, there have been many detractors to this series, but you know what? It's not bad. In fact, it gets pretty damn good at times (I'm looking at you, books 3 and 6). It has a host of well-developed (if archetypal) characters, a fleshed-out world with its own internal logic and mystery, and a rather cohesive overarching narrative. I haven't read them since the 7th one came out, though, but I don't think I'm ready to go back to #1 yet.

The series I'm looking forward most to (re)visiting is Stephen King's Dark Tower series. My history with this series is rather odd. First, I read the fourth book before any of the others. Since I was about 14 at the time, my dear old dad took it upon himself to go through with white-out and take out all the naughty and blashpemous bits (including any mention of the gods, even in phrases like "by the gods"). I thought it was stupid then, I think it's horrifying now. Do that to a book? God forbid. Never going to happen on my watch. Anyway, after that I checked out the first three from the library. My mom wasn't too keen on the idea since she was of the opinion that King got his stories from Satan Himself, but I read them regardless and loved them. Then I re-read the fourth one, which is still probably my favorite, Wizard and Glass. 5-7 weren't out then. In college, the fifth came out, and I read it and liked it, but I sped through that one so quick I barely remember any of it. By the time 6 and 7 were released, I had been so long away from it that I never made the time to get back to it.

That time is coming, though, and as soon as I wrap up my Master's portfolio defense, I'm jumping back into Mid-World with both feet.

I'll interject here about long books that are standalone, for these too draw me in. Problem is, I have a lot of these, but I haven't had the time to get to them. I got 11/22/63 and 1Q84 for Christmas, but there was simply no time to read them before the semester began. All in good time though.

Ok, so going back to this deeper reason for loving the long books, and books in general (and by extension, film and theater and roleplaying games as well). There's a quote by Dave Scott, the 7th man to walk on the moon (ASTRONAUTS ARE MY FAVORITE OF ALL!!!!!!!!). I think it gets to the heart of what I'm talking about, the part of the human existence that lives for this visiting of other worlds:

As I stand out here in the wonders of the unknown at Hadley, I sort of realize there’s a fundamental truth to our nature: man must explore.

Now, Hadley was the moon base for many of the Apollo missions, but replace "Hadley" with Oz, Barsoom, Mid-World, Hogwarts, Westeros, or anywhere and you've got it. This man--a man of science, accomplished, crazy smart, as all astronauts back in the early/glory days of space flight had to be--steps out of his lander and onto the surface of another planet. He can see the earth just sitting there in space, so small, the stars never having been ever so large. His friends have traveled here before (only six of them, true) and no doubt they told the most amazing, beautiful stories about their experiences there. And when he's there, it is nevertheless so new, so awe-inspiring, so maginificent, and what does he say? Man must explore.

This is what fiction brings us: the chance to explore, to go out and experience new places, new people, new things. This is why fiction will never go extinct; the need to explore is a fundamental human trait. This is what makes fiction so great and lasting, and why I love reading it, even over and over again: I've found a place while exploring and it so captivates me that I never want to leave and that I want to share with everyone. I'm sure you've seen or heard me gush over a book--it's because I had such a great time exploring, I want everyone else to come with me!

So read, my friends. Read. No matter what else you've got going on, there's always 20 minutes at least that you can sneak in before you go to bed (for example) for you to explore every night. Don't deny yourself that experience.

Posted via email from BLOG.NATHANIELRAY

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