Jason Z. Christie's Blog, page 5

Ten Things Writers Learned from Usenet

From: https://web.archive.org/web/201206052... / MONDAY, 28 MAY 2012

A long, long time ago, before most of you people had computers, writers ruled the Internet. There was FTP, email and Usenet. Okay, there was Archie and Gopher and stuff, telnet, too. But mostly just FTP, email, and Usenet.

Usenet was for readers and writers. Before there was a web (really, there was such a time), everyone who was anyone was a member of Usenet's 30,000 or so discussion groups.  Imagine a message board where you could cross-post to other message boards. Yes, it was as chaotic as it sounds. The golden age of trolling.

But also a great time and place for writers. Oh, and we used to kick it with Stephen King, Peter Straub, Terry Pratchett, Rebecca Ore and others. Did you know, for instance, that Maryanne Keyhoe has a head shaped like an olive loaf? Or that Constantine Tobio does a pretty great Barney impression? That was Trashcan Man. He started a flame war between rec.pets.cats and alt.tasteless that actually got a mention in Wired, at one time...

The Internet was almost composed almost entirely of words, and writers ruled. That's where I learned to write, and so did many others. I suspect we all took away some of the same lessons from the blast-furnace atmosphere of Usenet, and were made better writers for it.

 1. Typo-pouncing, grammar nazi, context-placing flamers will hand you your ass every time. And none of your fancy spellcheckers for us, generally speaking. Everything you wrote had to be more or less perfect.

 2. A thick skin in response to criticism. No matter how cool and well-liked you were, someone was always ready to take you down a notch. No holds barred, either. This wasn't family-friendly Facebook. Things got very ugly on a regular basis. Man up.

 3. If you weren't funny, you almost weren't worth reading. Humor matters. You can also get your point across much more effectively with humor than, say, logic...

4. Just about everyone had a clique of friends, they helped out in rough patches. Social networking began on Usenet. It's more or less dead, but a lot of my friends persist to this day. Even enemies on Usenet are friends compared to the rest of the world, for many of us.

5. You also had to know your audience, whether you were trying to troll or just write entertaining posts. 30,000 discussion groups meant you had a target audience out there waiting for you, if you could just figure out what it was. If you had no real target demographic, you could always write for the surrealists of alt.alien.vampire.flonk.flonk.flonk or alt.fan.karl-malden.nose. But even that was a genre and a market.

6. You're only as good as the last thing you wrote. You might have been funny last month, bucko, but your posts this month are unfunny and uninteresting. Therefore you are unfunny and uninteresting. Next...

7. The internet has a long memory. You couldn't get away with any real bullshit on Usenet, because those posts are archived forever, and no one will let you forget what you said in the summer of 1997. Watch your tongue.

8. Write every day. This was all casual fun to us, back then, but posting once a week or a few times a month made you a hanger-on. Some of us gave the appearance of being on there 24 hours a day.

9. Put some thought behind it. Funny or not, stupid people were ridiculed terribly on Usenet. But there weren't a lot of stupid people, because, unlike the web, you actually had to know a little bit about computers to get on there, generally speaking. AOL disaster aside...

10. Memes. Yeah, most of the stuff you people think is cute is fifteen year old Usenet material. 'Teh'? that was us? Cheezburger talk? Also us. Horribly offensive images? Also us. Meow...

I could go on, but I'm only preaching to the choir. Read more about Usenet here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usenet

Hail (Project) Eris! Hail Discordia!

 

I have *way* too much time on my hands, and way too little to show for it by way of productivity. What I do have is a total fascination with my Playstation Classic. I managed to pick up two Playstation minis at that sweet spot when everyone hated them, but before they were modded. As a result, I think I got them for $40 each. Now I can’t recommend them enough.

Previously, I had installed Bleemsync, which was very nice. But when Project Eris came around, I made the seemingly fatal n00b mistake of installing it without upgrading the power supply. That led to a semi-bricking.  Prior to that, I was just happy with Tony Hawk Pro Skater, in its various incarnations. Now, with the advent of a proper power supply, and a few other add-ons, I am looking at about 25 game systems, including a working Amiga computer emulation, wi-fi, keyboard, mouse, four controllers. That includes MAME arcade emulation, and just about every game released for the systems installed. Sure, I am unlikely to ever play Odyssey2 games extensively, or Gameboy games, but it sure is nice to have everything on one box.

Of course, I have the luxury of time, and semi-obsession. I have probably put about 200 hours of work into it, thus far. As a result, I can probably give you a few vague pointers. You might have some of these items laying around the house already, which will minimize your investment.

As I said, get a proper variable voltage power supply. I won’t get into specifics, as all the info is out there already. But this is a must. You’ll want a spacious USB thumbdrive. I’d go with a 128 gig one, personally. A powered USB hub is going to be required unless you plan on playing alone exclusively. There are two working wi-fi adapters out there, and my installation was almost entirely automatic. Throw in a USB keyboard and mouse, a few controllers, and you’re basically set for life. It’s all over but the game hunting and configuration. If you want to go absolutely nuts, get a USB hard drive to house everything. You can also get a cheap right-angle “On The Go” USB connector to add another port, although I have to say, that can make everything a bit flakey. Mine is a kind of loose and tends to lose contact if you accidentally pull on the controller cable.

To get the most out of the machine, you’ll have to become familiar with a few different pieces of software. Project Eris, for one. But that’s pretty simple, on the surface. One really nice feature is the ability to actually replace the internal games on the PSC with your own via mods. That makes it a Tony Hawk box without any need for any external peripherals whatsoever. Or whatever games you enjoy most. There are 20 internal ones built in, most all of which are terrible. So you should be able to put your twenty favorites on there.

Getting the games themselves is on you, but that’s not hard to do.

Once you get into the nuts and bolts of things, you’ll have to understand Emulation Station. Again, it’s not very complex. Be careful editing text files, though. A single misplaced symbol can render it useless until you fix it.

Emulation Station will lead you to understanding RetroArch, the underlying emulation software. Here, things get a bit more complicated. There are a LOT of settings. Don’t change them. Unless you sort of know what you’re doing, and even then, try to change only one thing at a time, then test your new configuration. Retroarch/Project Eris use cores to emulate the various systems. Luckily you can get them all in one fell swoop. All you have to do is put them in the right place.

The cores, though, will lead you to LibRetro, which is the library RetroArch is built on. In many cases, the core is all you need. But sometimes you’ll need a system BIOS to make it all work. Again, they are not hard to locate and install. Help is out there for almost any problem. In fact, if you really can’t find a solution, it’s probably because it’s obvious. I couldn’t get the Atari 5200 emulation to work for the longest time, or even find good info on making it work. Turns out you just have to go to RetroArch once you launch the 5200, and change the system setting from Atari 800 to 5200. It took seconds, once I realized how to do it. Silly.

I recommend you not go bananas and just slam everything on there at once. Take a slower, long term approach. It’s really a gaming system that will last years or decades. If you go all out at once, you’ll just be burying yourself.

Take it a system at a time, and don’t just unpack an archive of ROMs and bung them onto the USB drive. You’ll get a ton of duplicates and variants, and taking them off one by one using Emulation Station is a chore. You can move the USB drive to your computer, of course, but you’re better off being at least a little selective when you install games in the first place.

You’ll want to locate the MAME .78 romset. That is generally the best series for use on low-powered machines like the PSC or Raspberry Pi. And, holy crap, just delete anything that says Mahjong! Unless you speak Japanese, or are extremely patient and have a connected keyboard, they are useless. Even if they are all strip mahjong, which they seem to be. And, yeah, there might be a few games you want to hide or delete, if you’re worried about your kids seeing an eight or sixteen bit nipple. I’m not too sure a little kid would even understand what’s going on in a pornographic Atari 2600 game, but they exist.

To really get the most out of the machine, seek out the modified cores from KMFDManiac. This guy has squeezed a lot more performance out of some of the cores, making stuff that was unplayable work pretty smoothly. He deserves a lot respect and support, as do the other developers. They’ve basically given us endless hours of joy and nostalgia without every getting much in return.

You’ll also want a Screenskraper account. I recommend you sign up to their Patreon for $10 a month, at least until you have your system massaged to perfection. That lets you pull down screenshots and box covers at a rate of 50,000 a night. While that might sound outrageous, I’ve probably pulled 200,000 images or so, making everything look really nice. A deluxe screentshot/box  cover/logo/cartridge combo is composed of up to four images, so if you have a full array of games, it can take a few nights, even at 50,000 images a night. 

Again, these guys are tirelessly devoted to the cause, and don’t force anyone to pay anything at all. You can get basic screenshots via Wi-Fi for free, but you’ll basically be running it all night every night as you sleep, and still never come close to completion. These guys are so lax on the financial side of things, I actually had most of my screenshots before they had ever changed me for the first month. But to be supportive, of course I didn’t cancel it, and will even let things ride for at least another month.

There are also mods and skins for both Project Eris and Emulation Station, and they are pretty much a must if you want things to look really cool. What’s the point of having 720p HDMI clarity for your retro games if the front end is plain text?

Finally, there is the Project Eris desktop app. While I did use it for a while, I found that I’m not particularly happy with it, and now do everything without it. More than once, my Emulation Station systems came up showing almost no games, even though they were already installed. It seems to be a bit hit and miss. I am hoping the 1.1 update for Project Eris and the desktop app fix a few things. Maybe I was using it wrong, I don’t know.

If you’re not a Sony fan, you can apparently get good results with one of the Genesis or Super Nintendo minis, just without Playstation games.

And there you have it. For $100 or so, you can build an amazing game machine. You might not want 6000 Commodore 64 games, but if you do, have at it. The Amiga add-on, Amiberry, is a bit complicated, but so was the Amiga. You can even get mods to let you run PSP and Nintendo DS games, and they mostly work well. I have maxed things out at the Dreamcast, where about half of the games are playable, if that. No 3DO games seem to work on the PSC, unfortunately. But beggars, choosers, all that. The same software can be installed on your PC or laptop, if you want to push the limits of emulation. I think people have things working all the way up to the PS3 and Wii, if not beyond. It’s an ever-moving target, retro emulation.

Here a few links to get you started on your journey, should you choose to embark:

Project Eris: https://modmyclassic.com/project-eris/

 

(These three are all installed when you install Project Eris…)

Emulation Station: https://emulationstation.org/

RetroArch: https://www.retroarch.com/

Libretro: https://www.libretro.com/

 

KMDFManiac’s GitHub page: https://github.com/KMFDManic/NESC-SNESC-Modifications/releases

Skraper.net: https://www.skraper.net/

Support your developers!

Book Review – William Gibson – Pattern Recognition

 

“He took a duck to the face at 250 knots.”

Woah. If you want to learn to write well, read King. If you want to feel like you’ll never, ever be good enough, Read Gibson. Pattern Recognition, his eight novel, is in every way, a spectacular achievement.

Gibson has slowly morphed from writing about the future to writing about the present. In fact, reading this 2003 novel in 2021 makes it feel somewhat quaint. There’s still a techy feel to the proceedings (steganography, online tracking, message board subversion), but it’s firmly set in the realm of the now. There’s no futurism to speak of, just an attempt to deal with the bleak present.

It follows the life of one Cayce Pollard. In a tiny nod to Neuromancer, although her name is pronounced “Casey” ala Edward, she prefers to go by the pronunciation “Case.”  And here the comparisons end. Gibson is a virtuoso writer, and I feel that Pattern Recognition more firmly cements that fact more than any of his other work. While Neuromancer was exciting and full of far-reaching ideas, those ideas slightly outpaced the writing, I’ve always felt. Not quite to the degree of Philip. K. Dick’s work, but I have always had a problem with him naming so many of the characters so similarly. Cage, Case, Cath, Wage. A minor sticking point, to be sure. 

This novel is a marvel of complexity, while never being confusing. It’s an expertly woven series of mysteries within mysteries. Before the book is even half completed, you will be aching to know what lies ahead. And each thread is resolved by the end, in a satisfying conclusion that keeps you guessing until the last pages. It even has a somber but still happy ending, which gives a spot of optimism despite our gloomy collective future.

While feeling like a bit of a throwback when read in the present age, it also has sweet bits of nostalgia. The Time-Sinclair ZX-81 computer makes an appearance. There’s even a bit about Stephen King’s Wang. It was written shortly after 9/11, and incorporates that bit of history into the text in an entirely natural fashion.

I won’t delve into the plot itself, because I could scarcely do it justice. It has all the elements of a great Gibson work: paranoia, feelings of unreality, a talented but flawed protagonist. The only box left unticked is that there is no drug addict in this one, which I had started to feel was one of his trademarks of character development. I think it also does a great job of making me care about the lead character. Above I said that this one can scarcely be compared to Neuromancer, but that’s not fully the case. There is actually an element of “Ghosts in the Machine” here, but presented in an organic form, removed from the world of AI and Constructs.

In fact checking myself for this review, I have discovered that this novel came before Zero History, which I have also read, and I have to say I enjoyed this one more. But I had no idea they were part of an informal trilogy. That book doesn’t quite stick in my head like this one does, although I did recognize the similarities. What I didn’t recall was that they share a character. Unfortunately, it’s not Cayce.

As testimony to Gibson’s brilliance, I’ll leave you with this paragraph, which is a bit of a spoof of online pretension, while at the same time exhibiting a stunning breadth of knowledge. It’s a message board posting from one of the minor but important characters.

“Really it is entirely about story, though not in any sense that any of you seem familiar with. Do you know nothing of narratology? Where is Derridean "play" and excessiveness? Foucauldian limit-attitude? Lyotardian language-games? Lacanian Imaginaries? Where is the commitment to praxis, positioning Jamesonian nostalgia, and despair – as well as Habermasian fears of irrationalism – as panic discourses signaling the defeat of Enlightenment hegemony over cultural theory? But no: discourses on this site are hopelessly retrograde. Mama Anarchia”

My First and Only Comic Book Ever Published - Hemo Hero #1

So, I knew a guy online from the nerdcore hip-hop era who happened to also be a hemophiliac. Knowing that I was an author, he approached me to develop a comic for his hemophilia foundation with him. What we came up with was Hemo Hero.

Now, I'm not what you'd call a kid's writer. I'm pretty much the opposite of that. What would you call that? Oh, yeah, an adult writer. So I was in some ways an odd choice. I mean, I am ONE OF THE GREATEST UNKNOWN WRITERS OF THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY and all, but still. (Citation: https://www.amazon.com/Radar-Love-Ultimate-Hustle-1/dp/1479222054/) I tend toward the lurid, the pulpy, the sex-and-druggy. It was a fun challenge, reining myself in. To a degree. It did lead to ongoing problems, as you shall see.

For one thing, I was good for at least one off-color joke per issue. In this one, I SWEAR TO GOD, I THOUGHT SHE WAS FOURTEEN. Actually, she was. But for demographic reasons, he changed her age to twelve. "THE JOKE STAYS", I said. I'm sort of a dick when it comes to creative license. I also argued to change 'burrito' back to Hot Pocket. I just noticed that made a sort of extended tasteless joke.

Good. Whatever.

The artist was a female, so I don't think we can be blamed fully for how the character's sister came out. She is borderline manga-esque in how cute her outfits are.

Another complaint he lodged at me repeatedly (issues two and three were written, but never published) was that I wasn't writing toward the target demographic enough, and had too many things that would fly over a younger kid's head. So, naturally, I went even more high-minded. I know my son could read it at that age. Plus a good book should expand one's vocabulary, and foster further intellectual development.

It was in-jokey, at times. The character was originally named Baxter. Until someone pointed out that Baxter was a company that poisoned a bunch of hemophiliacs or something. Oops.

It all fell apart over funding. Because, as we learned with the first issue, the hemophilia-related pharmaceutical companies wouldn't advertise in the same issue as each other. Our plan was to run two ads, which would fund a thousand copies per issue. Instead we could only run one, which lead to a shortfall, ending our noble experiment right after launch. I didn't handle the business end, but I tend to think this could have been overcome, somehow.

One very exciting connection which we were unable to utilize was the fact that Jay, the project lead, had met the woman from Mad TV and Family Guy at a conference, where he learned that her son was a hemophiliac. Naturally, the third issue featured a cameo by her, and was full of jokes lightly bashing The Simpsons and Family Guy. It was probably my one big chance to get noticed as a writer.

sighs

At any rate, I'm really happy to have been involved, and still find myself proud of the work we did together. Yes, it is decidedly a bit Calvin & Hobbes derived. There are worse things to riff off of than that. I do wish it had been longer, and with less filler. We learned a lot of things along the way that would have made the next issues much better. The ending, which felt good on paper, just sort of trails off. There are a few minor typos I'm not too happy about.

But it's a sweet story, funny, and was for a good cause. And, hey, I get to say I published a comic book once. Sort of a dream come true. I do have a few graphic novels I'd love to produce someday, if I ever meet the right artist. The truth is, most of them are horrendously expensive. All I can offer is some sort of financial incentive upfront, and the rights for them to keep 100% of the copies they sell themselves. I think it might happen eventually.

And, of course, I'd love to revive the series, if one of the seven people who read this article have a way to make that happen. If nothing else, it does go to show you that pulling something like this off is entirely possible for a few determined individuals, even if only on a small scale. It's nice to think we amused and entertained a few kids and adults who probably needed a bit of cheering up.

At any rate, here it is in its entirely, Hemo Hero #1.

BONUS! I dug out the script for the third Hemo Hero, my favorite one.

Hemo Hero Issue #3 – The Family Guy Issue

Sera (To mom and dad – all seated on the couch: “That Simpsons episode was hilarious!”

Bastian (Walking in, reading a book. Doesn't look up.): “Was it the one where Homer jumps the shark?”

Sera: “Snuh? No, but Family Guy's next. I hope Peter fights the chicken. That never gets old.”

Bastian: “It kinda does.”

Mom: “No Family Guy for you, Bastian. It's too adult.”

Bastian: “Oh, dear. I guess I shall have to continue reading this book on epistemology.”

Sera: “You're learning about bugs?”

Bastian: “That's entomology.”

Sera: “The origins of words?”

Bastian: “Etymology. Epistemology is concerned with the origins of knowledge itself. But, yes, this cartoon is too advanced for me.”

Dad: “That Lois is kind of hot.”

Sera: “Dad!”

Dad: “Almost as hot as your mom.”

Sera: “Dad!”

Mom: “She really is.”

Sera: “Mom! Dad, you're more of a Homer than a Peter, anyway.”

Dad: “Gee, thanks.”

Sera: “Bastian, that makes you Stewie.”

Bastian: “Shut up, Meg.”

Sera: “It's true. You're both young, super-smart. You build...things.”

Bastian: “But he uses his powers for evil. At least he used to.”

Sera: “What's the difference?”

Bastian: (sighs) “Not another discussion on subjective morality. I told you, the nihilist position is untenable. For example...”

Sera: “Hahahaha! Peter bumped his knee!”

Bastian: “I'm out.”

Bastian: (In his room.): “Perhaps a quick glance at Facebook...”

(Checks his computer.): “Oh, dear. It appears a fellow bleeder is being bullied. And he's been challenged to a fight.”

Bastian (Typing.): “Hey, Quint. What's wrong?”

Quint (Typing.): “That over-sized third-grader wants to fight me in real life.”

Bastian (Typing.): “Billy? Why?”

Quint (Typing.): “Probably because his last name is Dumas.”

Bastian (Typing.): “Ha! What are you going to do?”

Quint (Typing.): “I don't know. He says that if he sees me in the park tomorrow, he'll hit me.”

Bastian (Typing.): “Perhaps you need an adult.”

Quint (Typing.): “Tattle? Snitches get stitches, Bastian.”

Bastian (Typing.): “Ah, yes. The schoolyard code. Well, no friend of mine will be pushed around by a future dropout.”

Quint (Typing.): “I'm kinda scared...”

Bastian (Typing.): “Don't be. I'll handle it.”

Quint (Typing.): “Promise?”

Bastian (Typing.): “Scout's honor.”

Quint (Typing.): “What's that?

Bastian (Typing.): “A forgotten concept, sadly. But I'll be there.”

Quint (Typing.): “Cool beans.”

Bastian (Typing.): “Who says that?”

Quint (Typing.): “Your mom?”

Bastian (Typing.): “She actually does. Well, don't fret. I'll be there.”

Quint (Typing.): “Yay!”

Bastian (Typing.): “Blood brothers stick together.”

Bastian (Says.): “This is a job for...”

(Enters closet.)

(Emerges in costume.): “The Hemo Hero!”

(Pauses.): “Tomorrow. This book is fascinating.”

Bastian (Sitting in bed in costume, chuckles.): “Oh, Ayn Rand. You were such a card!”

(Bastian soon dozes, and dreams of flying, and battling a giant robot, dodging laser eyes and missiles, mid-air.)

(Smashes the robot in the face.): “Take that, Dumas!”

(The robot grabs Bastian, who struggles in the giant's fist, until he bites its thumb and escapes.)

Robot: “No fair!”

Bastian: “Next time, pick on someone your own size. Hasta la vista, Mr. Roboto!”

(Bastian flys behind the robot and pushes a big red button on its back, causing it to fall apart and explode.)

Bastian: “Victory is mine! Why do giant robots have self-destruct buttons in the first place?”

(Bastian flies off into the sunset.)

The next day, Bastian is leaving the house, carrying a bat and duffle bag.

Bastian (To Sera.): “Going to the park.”

Sera: “You? Baseball?”

Bastian: “Healthy body, healthy mind. Besides, I could help the Cubs win the World Series someday.”

Sera: “As if. Be careful...”

Bastian: “Kids playing in a park. What could possibly go wrong?”

Sera: “With you? Anything.”

Bastian: “Nevertheless. Farewell, dear sister.”

Sera watches him leave, eying him with suspicion. “He's up to something...”

At the park, Bastian meets up with Quint.

Quint: “A baseball bat! Brilliant!”

Bastian: “This? Oh, no. Mere window dressing. A cover story. You see, Quint, I'm actually a superhero.”

Quint: “Bastian, you so crazy.”

Bastian: “It's 'you're'.”

Quint: “Vernacular. Idiomatic expression.”

Bastian: “Touché'. Well played.”

At the restrooms, Bastian changes and comes out in his costume.

Quint: “Woah!”

Bastian: “Told you...”

Quint: “I'm sorry I doubted you.”

Bastian: “Understandable. Now, let us...baseball.”

Bastian and Quint play catch in an idyllic setting, under a beautiful summer sky. Birds and kites fly overhead. Then they switch it up and Quint bats as Bastian pitches.

Quint: “You're really good at that! I can't even get a piece of it.”

Bastian: “Baseball is largely a study in physics. Mass, acceleration, trajectory...”

As Quint is preparing to swing, a shadow looms over him ominously.

Billy: “What's up, nerds?” (Grabbing the bat.)

Billy: “I told you to stay out of the park. I'm gonna bust your nose...”

Bastian (Leaping between them.): “You'll have to go through me, first!”

Billy (Laughing.): “Who are you? Super Freak?”

Bastian: “The Hemo Hero. Defender of the defenseless. And I must warn you, I've watched a lot of Youtube fights.”

Billy: “Looks like I'm going to bust two noses today.”

Bastian: “I really didn't think this through.”

Quint (Filming with iPhone.): “Worldstar!”

As Billy draws back, an even bigger shadow engulfs him.

Sera (In costume.): “I wouldn't do that if I were you...”

Bastian: “Sera! I mean, 'Serum'!”

Quint: “No. Way.”

Sera (To Billy.): “What's wrong with you? Picking on little kids...”

Billy: “Well, bigger ones fight back.”

Sera: “I oughta kick your butt!”

Another shadow partially covers Sera...

Family Guy Woman: “Are you bullying this boy? Pick on someone your own size!”

Sera: “Um, I'm taller than you.”

Bastian: “She look like a man.”

Sera: “Poor grammar, Bastian? Anyway, she does not.”

Bastian: “Allow me this one pop culture reference, please.”

Sera: “Who are you, lady?”

Bastian: “Mrs. Swan. I told you.”

Sera: “Anyway, I'm defending my br-, um, my sidekick.”

Bastian: “You're the sidekick!”

Sera: “I see it as more of a partnership. Anyway, Mrs. Swan, this pint-sized crime fighter here is a hemophiliac.”

Quint: “So am I.”

FGW: “That changes everything. I'm sorry I frightened you.”

Sera: “You didn't.”

FGW: “Nice costume, by the way.”

Sera (As they walk away together, talking.): “Thanks! Do you really think so? I was worried the skirt was too short...”

The three boys stand facing each other.

Billy: “Well, this is awkward...”

Bastian: “So did you learn your lesson so we can wrap this up?”

Billy: “Not really. If bullies could be swayed by logic or empathy, they wouldn't be bullies.”

Quint: “He's got a good point, there...”

Bastian: “Yeah. If he wears a hat, no one will see it.”

Quint: “Lol!”

Billy sulks away, fuming and blushing, embarrassed.

Quint: “Thanks, Bastian. I mean...Hemo Hero.”

Bastian: “Not a problem. But I have to run. Others may need me.”

Quint: “See you Monday.”

Bastian: “Toodles.”

At home, Dad is reading the Beck issue of Wired, smoking a tobacco pipe, and mom is knitting, either a gimp mask or a ball gag.

Mom: “What did you do today, Bastian?”

Bastian: “Battled evil. Maybe saved a life. Struck a blow for justice. You know.”

Mom: “Cool beans!”

Dad (Not looking up.) “Good for you, son.”

That night in bed, Bastian continues his dream. As he flies away, we zoom in to the pieces of the broken robot to reveal a label that says, “Property of Stewie Griffin”...

END

Woah! I found #2, also. Turns out we used Dropbox, not Google Drive for working. Twas on another computer, too.

Hemo Hero Issue #2

1: Sera (on the phone): “Yes! I'll ask my mom!”

2: (Hanging up) “Mom, can I go to a concert?” she yells.

3: Mom enters Sera's room, which is decorated with posters. “Hmmm. I don't know... what kind of concert? Sounds dangerous, ” she says.

4: Sera: “It's a rap show...”

5: Mom: “That's gonna be a no go,” mom says.

6: Sera: “It's nerdcore, mom. It's about as dangerous as the library.”

7: Mom: “Libraries are one of the most dangerous institutions in America...”

8: Sera: “Mom! I don't have time for this.”

9: Mom, sighing. “I suppose. If your father says so.”

10: Sera, excitedly dialing. “Dad! I want to go to a show.”

11: Dad: “Like a freak show?”

12: Sera: “Ugh! My parents are impossible. A concert.”

13: Dad: “Ah, the symphony. Sounds sublime. I approve.”

14: Sera: “Thanks, dad!.” Sera hangs up before he asks any more questions.

15: Sera: “He whole-heartedly approves.”

16: Mom: “Take your brother...”

17: Sera: “Aaargh!”

18: Mom: “Final offer.”

19: Sera: “Fine. Bastian!”

20: Bastain appears in pajamas. “You bellowed?”

21: Sera: “Get dressed. We're going to a concert.”

22: Bastain: “Ah, excellent. I love the symphony.”

23: Sera: “It's a rap show.”

24: Bastain: “Sounds dreadful.”

25: Sera: “No, it's a nerd rap show.”

26: Bastain: “You're really not helping.”

27: Sera: “It's a hemophilia benefit...”

28: Bastain: “I'm down.”

29: Sera dials her friend as Bastain leaves. “They said yes! But I have to bring Bastain... I know. We'll meet you there.”

30: Bastain reappears, standing in the b-boy stance, sideways Fifth Element baseball cap, Public Enemy shirt, Locs sunglasses, baggy jeans, unlaced Chuck Taylor Converse sneakers. Around his neck hangs a Video Toaster card on a gold chain.

31: Sera: “You're kidding, right?”

32: Bastain: “How would anyone know the difference?”

33: Sera: “Let's just go before this gets any worse. Mom, we're leaving!”

34: Mom, as the two leave out of the front door, calls out “No twerking!”

On the bus. Bastain: “This bus smells like pee.”

36: Sera: “All buses do.'

37: Bastain: “So who are we going to see?”

38: Sera: “Um, AlphaRiff. He's also a video producer and stuff. Really cool.”

39: Bastain: “Who else?”

40: Sera: “Billy the Fridge. He's huge.”

41: Bastain: “Big Pun.” (capitalization intended.)

42: Sera meets her friend outside, and they approach the ticket window

43: Sera: “Three, please. One child.”

44: Ticket clerk: “You're all children.”

45: Sera: “Whatever.”

46: Clerk: “Thirty even.”

47: Bastain: “Money well spent.”

48: Inside, Sera says, “Okay, Bastain Rhymes. Don't leave the building. And no antics!”

49: Bastain “Perish the thought. I scarcely know the meaning of the words hijinks and shenanigans.”

50: Onstage, Billy the Fridge and Alpha Riff are performing together, in a Bleedfree shirt, and an “I Bleed Hip-Hop” shirt. Trista, Doug Funnie, MC Frontlot, High-C, Ish1da, Press B and others can be spotted.

51: AlphaRiff: “All the bleeders in the crowd say, 'ho'!”

52: Bastain and others, “Ho!”

53: Billy the Fridge: “Buy a clue if you just don't know!”

54: Bastain runs on stage and stage dives. Then he crowd surfs.

55: AlphaRiff: “Thank y'all for coming out tonight! Peace!”

56: Outside after the show, Bastain says: “What an epic celebration of individuality!”

57: Sera: “I'm glad you had fun. I was only mildly embarrassed.”

58: Bastain: “I can do better.”

59: Back at home, Bastain runs in and says to mom and dad, “It was awesome! So much iambic pentameter and word play!”

60: Mom: “Glad you two had fun, dear. But it's past your bedtime.”

61: Bastain: “I am not even going to complain. Goodnight.”

************************ Part 2 ************************

62: The next day, Bastain is on his laptop. Sera: “What are you working on today?”

63: Bastain: “A location-based messaging system that allows me to track the status of hemos worldwide in real time.”

64: Sera: “Oh, really? What's it called?”

65: Bastain, looking at her quizzically: “Twitter.”

66: Sera: “#Groan.”

67: Bastain: “According to this, there's a kid in our neighborhood that needs help. His mom says he's scared of getting injections.”

68: Sera: “And?”

69: Bastain: “This is a job for the Hemo Heroes!”

70: Sera: “Great. Do I have to wear the costume?”

71: Bastain: “You kinda do.”

72: Sera: “Oh, all right. But you're stacking the dishwasher tonight.”

73: Bastain: “To the bloodmobile! Um, after we change.”

74: Outside, Sera is wearing her Serum costume (skirt, cape, HH logo), and Bastain is wearing his, with a half-face mask (ala Zorro) and utility belt. She's pulling him in a Radio Flyer wagon.

75: They pass the friendly neighborhood mailman, who says, “A little early for Halloween, eh, kids?” and smiles.

76: Sera: “Cosplay,” she explains as they walk by.

77: “Stupid clotter,” Bastain says under his breath after they are out of earshot.

78: Sera: “Bastain!”

79: Bastain: “What? He is.”

80: Sera: “That's a horrible attitude.”

81: Bastain: “It's true. They call us bleeders, don't they?”

82: Sera: “You call yourselves that! Most people are just unaware of hemophilia. Besides, he's probably not stupid.”

83: Bastain: “Probably...”

84: Sera: “Well, superheroes should be better than that.”

85: Bastain: “What is this, a comic book? That's just a stereotype. Superheroes are humans, too.”

86: Sera: “Well, it's rude. Be nice.”

87: Bastain: “Turn left at the corner. It's the next street up.”

88: Outside of the house, Sera says, “Now what?”

89: Bastain: “Now we knock on the door.”

90: Sera: “We can't just knock on the door, and say, 'Hi, we're the Hemo Heroes. We heard there was a problem here.'”

91: Bastain: “Why not?”

92: Sera: “Look at us! They'll call the cops or something.”

93: Bastain: “I begrudgingly admit you may be correct. I have an idea.”

94: He holds a boombox over his head and begins playing Rick Astley's “Never Gonna Give You Up”.

95: Sera: “How will that help?”

96: Bastain: “I just love this song.”

97: Sera: “Look, Spongebob curtains. That must be his room.”

98: Bastain: “A rather pedestrian choice.”

99: Sera throws some pebbles, and a boy opens his window. “Wow!” he says. “Who are you guys?”

100: Bastain: “We're the Hemo Heroes, defenders of justice and stuff.”

101: Boy: “Neat!”

102: Bastain: “I am Hemo Hero, and this is, um...”

103: Sera: “Serum.”

104: Bastain: “Nice...” To the boy, “Are you okay? I heard there was a problem.”

105: Boy: “I don't like factor”

106: Bastain: “Why not? It's awesome.”

107: Boy: “I don't like the needle.”

108: Bastain: “Perfectly understandable. I didn't either, at first. But it's just a tiny pinch. I hardly even notice it anymore.”

109: Boy: “I didn't want to take it, and got punished.”

110: Bastain: “This is quite the conundrum.”

111: Boy: “What's that?”

112: Bastain: “A problem. A puzzle. How old are you?”

113: Boy: “Six.”

114: Bastain: “Well, I'm only seven, I think. But eventually I'll learn to do it myself.”

115: Boy: “That doesn't sound too bad.”

116: Bastain: “It certainly beats the alternative.”

117: Boy: “I didn't know there was anyone else like me around here. This is so cool!”

118: Bastain: “My advice is roll with it. Own it. Accept it as a way of life, and make the best of it.”

119: Boy: “Really? I don't have anyone to talk to about it. I'm afraid I'll get teased.”

120: Bastain: “Stupid clotters.”

121: Boy: “I know, right?”

122: They both smile, and a new friendship is forged.

123: Sera: “If I may, I would suggest you apologize to your parents, and tell them you won't argue about it again. They'll probably forgive you, and then you can come outside and play.”

123: Boy: “That's so crazy, it just might work.”

124: A few minutes later, he emerges, with a bath towel around his neck, and a handkerchief on his head, in emulation of Bastain.

125: Bastain: “Yes! Another victory for the Hemo Heroes!”

126: Boy: “Let's play Captain Blood!”

127: Bastain: “Aye! The bleedingest bleeder pirate what ever done bleeded. Avast!”

128: Sera sits under a tree and reads her Kindle while the two have pirate adventures in the same stylized fashion as the sabretooth encounter from the previous issue.

129: Boy: “Land ho! There they be plunder!” he says, looking through a spyglass.

130: Bastain: “Jolly Roger that, Cap'n. I'll man the rowboat for shore.”

131: On the island, they follow a dotted line across the sand to a giant X. The two dig up a treasure chest full of doubloons and jewels. Then they row it back to the pirate ship, which sports a stylized skull and crossbones flag wearing nerd glasses.

132: Sera looks up. “Time to go, Bastain.”

133: Bastain: “Landlubber...” To the boy, he says, “So, you think you'll be okay?”

134: Boy: “Are you kidding? Hemo Heroes aren't scared of anything. Neither is Captain Blood.”

135: Bastain: “Any time you need help, we'll be here.”

136: Boy: “My name's Ethan, by the way.”

137: Bastain, “Ethan, you da real MVP.”

138: Boy: “Lol. I have no idea what you're saying.”

139: Sera: “Bye! See you later!”

140: Bastain: “That was fun. I feel good about this.”

141: Sera: “Me, too, Bastain. Me, too.”

142: Bastain: “Now get to pulling, scurvy wench...”

143: Sera: “Watch it, HH. And you've got dishes to do...”

Yes, Games Guy, You Do Need An Idea Guy

Ugh. I love the gaming/coding community. But that one article endlessly circulating on Twitter, "No, Idea Guy, I Won't Make Your Game For You", the one with the picture of the dude with the endlessly punchable face, drives me nuts.

On one hand, yes, it's entirely true. A good game coder doesn't really need outside ideas. Any musician, writer, artist, coder worth his or her salt has more designs than they'll ever be able to implement. It's even highly relatable to me personally. People often tell me their half-baked, vague concepts for a novel, all of them terrible. They're not even writers.

Motherfucker, I have a twenty novel queue in my head, on my computer, and on paper. I'll likely never finish them all before I die. Ideas don't stop coming just because you already have a lot of them.

And yet...

There is probably one original game for every thousand clones released. We all know a lot of these are shovelware, using source bought off of eBay. But there are also tons of entry-level game coders learning the ropes by rehashing rehashes of rehashes.

Much like a novel, if you're not adding something new to the mix, I fail to see the point. You don't have to invent a new genre to create something noteworthy, but if you're working on yet another clone, you're wasting your life.

Look at Braid, for example. Even without the amazing storyline and puzzles, it stands out as the most incredibly lush Mario game of all time. Jonathan Blow took a tired genre and reinvented it from the ground up.

Jon Mak has done this a few times, most notably with Everyday Shooter and the somewhat poorly named Sound Shapes. They're both staggeringly inventive, even though they operate within existing frameworks.

Even if you're essentially recreating an existing game to get some dirt under your nails as a game coder, there's absolutely no reason not to innovate along the way. What's the point of learning to code by reinventing the wheel so you can do something innovative later, when you can strive to do that from the beginning?

I do understand the point of view of people who have lots of solid ideas. They're the ones staying up late, working their asses off, often in their spare time, to bring their vision to life. But to suggest that anyone who can half-ass code a game is also a font of solid new game ideas is a dangerous fallacy. All you have to do is peruse any app store's game section to realize that.

What if every one of those clone games was instead an attempt to do something new?

I guess what I'm trying to say is that projecting a justifiably arrogant attitude exuded by top game designer/coders onto the unwashed masses of mediocre coders is a detriment to game design. Some people can write code, but have no idea as to what constitutes a game worthy of writing in the first place.

Yes, some people are merely trying to cash in on a Candy Crush genre wave or whatever. And I sort of respect that. But that only leads to a million samey games, none of which are better than the original version they're copying.

Meh.

Ideas are bigger than code is the bottom line. I feel video games are art, and should be approached as such.

Now, I quit writing games somewhere around the time I started having sex with girls and smoking pot. I instead moved on to making music, and then ultimately writing novels. While I would love to devote the rest of my life to bringing a few of my visions to life, that's clearly not going to happen.

Instead, I used my favorite game concepts as background for a novella I wrote as a tribute to Douglas Adams. If you're a coder working on an unoriginal project, by all means, feel free to pursue one of these, instead.

Dual-joystick action game:

Chapter 4 – Reaper Madness

Prail was playtesting Reaper Madness at the moment. It was inspired in part by Piers Anthony’s On a Pale Horse and Eugene Jarvis’ seminal game Robotron, with a dash of The Sims.

It was a two-joystick affair, isometric three-quarter top down view. You were Death, aka the Grim Reaper, and your job was to harvest souls. The levels were progressive, one through ninety-nine. At its core was the premise that everyone hated The Sims. You would run in wearing a black cowl, swinging a scythe, and dispatch the people occupying each level. However, not everyone was marked for death, and you were penalized for killing the wrong people. Each level contained more people than the last, starting with the training level, a single room containing a single person, all the way through Armageddon, in which you had to kill ‘em all.

You moved the reaper with the left controller, and swung or threw the scythe with the right. Jumping was achieved by pushing down on the left stick, while depressing the right made the weapon fly out in the direction you were facing.

Prail worked diligently at creative level design. For instance, there were driving levels. Death rode a pale horse, naturally, but it could transform into a red Isuzu Amigo jeep as necessary. On a few levels, there was someone ahead of you on the highway destined to crash and die, and you had to catch up with them by the time they did so, lest their souls go uncollected. But for the most part, Death just rode or drove from scenario to scenario. Each level contained more souls than the last, which led to a few design problems. Currently, the Armageddon level was unwinnable, because by using Death’s conventional weapons, the sims multiplied faster than you could kill them.

Early playtesters found controversy in the killing of women and children, but their complaints fell upon deaf ears. In fact, Prail liked to see them squirm. The current favorite levels were the burning building, and the crashing airplane. Level eighty-eight was a mammoth skyscraper that was on fire ala the old Earth film The Towering Inferno. You raced from bottom to top, harvesting everyone. The combination of smoke, fire, heat and adrenaline was thrilling.

Another earlier level, thirty-three, placed you on an airplane plummeting to Earth while the pilot struggled to regain control. Some players opted to kill the pilot and copilot first, interestingly enough. Either way, Death survived. But players who played the level as Prail intended it were rewarded with a view of Death leaping from the plane with his shimmering black parachute.

She pondered the Armageddon problem and decided that she would probably just use some crude hack. Death could freeze the level for sixty seconds, but that wasn’t much help when you had an entire planet to eradicate. At least game design took her mind off of her work and personal problems for a while.

Retro Reboots:

Prail was aquiver. She’d never had a suitor before, a gentleman caller. She was so nervous at the prospect, she cranked out three quick games to relax. All three were updated classics. It was very rewarding to Prail to write updates to classic games. It was sort of like buying a cheap paint-by-numbers set at the Earth2 Wal-Mart and ending up with a Michelangelo when you were finished. She could turn off her brain and just do, for a change.

Prail found that the simplest way to update a game, eight-bit being her favorite source material, was to take them from two to three dimensions. She had always wondered why no one had made Conway’s Game of Life in 3D, so she started there. Prail wrote it in an hour, in sixteen lines of code, impressing herself. And she was notoriously difficult to please.

She resisted the urge to update the graphics or add sound. It started out as asterisks, and it seemed almost blasphemous to fuxor with that aesthetic, so she left well enough alone.

Next, she wrote Snafu 3D, an update of an old Mattel Intellivision game. In it, multiple flatworms moved around the screen leaving trails and trying to trap one another. If you hit a wall or a trail, game over. It had inspired many clones, including the light cycle sequence in Tron, a favorite on Praxis. Prail liked the simple complexity it possessed.

This project took longer, more than two hours, mainly because the jump to 3D required a lot of intelligent camera work and a new controller configuration. She toyed with the colour scheme a bit, and then reverted back to the original primary colors of red, blue, yellow and green.

Feeling somewhat pleased with herself, Prail took a deep breath and got herself a glass of nectar. Her final update before naptime (Praxalians didn’t attend full sleep cycles, but instead took Edison-like catnaps every few hours) was the Activision 2600 game Barnstorming.

It was nice and relaxing. You flew an ancient biplane over windmills, fences and through barns. As far as Prail could recall, that was it, really. But as an art project, it really gave her a chance to spread her wings. She recreated the original in 2D as best as she could remember and then tucked it away as an Easter egg.

From there it was child’s play to convert it to 3D. But here she really began to shine. Prail increased the framerate, giving everything a dreamlike feel to it. Then she added the option to view the game through various filters: Pointillism, Mondrian, Abstract Impressionist, even Cubist. It was almost pure art.

Feeling pleased, Prail tucked herself in under her desk and closed her eyes for a while.

Driving:

Prail’s stomach was a tornado, her heart a bass drum. The University of Southern California’s marching band played “Tusk” at max volume in her otherwise unoccupied head. Full of nervous energy, she cranked out a quick game.

Driven to Distraction was partly a game, partly a training sim. Prail hoped it might decrease incidents of vehicular homicide on Earth2. It was an automobile driving simulator with a twist. The player drove, but they didn’t control the perspective.

The driver’s gaze constantly wandered. It fiddled with the radio, rummaged through the glovebox. It lit cigarettes and joints. Sometimes it drank alcohol. All the player had to do was drive and not crash. It was extremely challenging. Then Prail added fast food levels where the car coasted into a drive-through, and the player had to drive while eating.

Finally, she added a cell phone. In a secret bit of sneak, Prail coded in messages and pictures from the driver’s girlfriend asking for poems, and the foolhardy player had to compose and type poetry while driving eighty miles an hour. These she siphoned off for her ever-growing collection. It was cool, and that was usually her goal. Having reached it, utterly exhausted, she napped for an entire hour.

Real-Time Strategy:

Prail was working on another epic game, ‘Barbarians’. It was based on the pre-gunpowder days on ancient Earth. She’d noticed the varied fighting styles of the different barbarian tribes from distant locations, and thought it would be fun to pit them against each other.

So far, she’d implemented Huns, Mongols, Vikings, and Vandals, and wanted to include Visigoths next. Her favorites were the Mongols and the Vikings. The Mongols were expert horsemen, small in stature. They could ride side-saddle and fire arrows with amazing accuracy. So well, she had to introduce heavy winds to handicap them.

There were two moves she was particularly enamored of. One strategy was to ride in single-file, an army of a thousand strong. When they reached their opponents, they would fan out and form an oncoming wall of death. The other involved splitting into three brigades. The decoy group would attack head on, while the other two would circle their prey from the left and right and attack from the rear. It was a devastating move. On the steppes, their home turf, they were unbeatable. Take them out of their element, however, and the tables turned.

In Viking villages, they met their demise.

The Vikings favored hand weapons such as swords, battleaxes and war hammers, although they were no slouches with arrows, either. Flaming arrows.

They also employed berserkers. Berserkers were great hulking brutes who lived only to fight and kill. They were so fierce they were kept subdued by their own kind until they were needed. Once unleashed on the battlefield, they would fly into a blood rage, snapping necks and severing spines left and right until they were killed or collapsed from exhaustion. They would even kill other Vikings.

Their secret weapon was mushrooms. The Vikings would feed amanita muscaria to their reindeer, and then collect the reindeer urine, which was filtered of toxins. Then drink it. It apparently kept them awake for days. Prail thought it was hilarious that the origins of Santa Claus and flying reindeer stemmed from use of a red and white psychedelic.

She was thinking about the Goths when a sensor sounded, indicating the approach of President Gorlax.

“Whoop, whoop,” it said.

Prail saved her work, and got nervous and dressed. Praxalians never wore clothes around each other, but gave in to the custom in order to appease other races.

MMORPGs:

Chapter 13 – Death Race 2000

Prail was debugging another of her games. While strip-mining the culture of Earth in an effort to understand why it fell, she’d uncovered a David Carradine and Sylvester Stallone vehicle, Death Race 2000. Sort of like Hanna-Barbera’s Wacky Races, it involved eight teams of drivers in a coast-to-coast race. Unlike Wacky Races, you scored extra points by killing people.

Prail elected to rip it off wholesale. She’d scanned in the vehicles from framegrabs and knocked them up into 3D models. She cheated a bit by only modeling the top halves of the humanoids, but had painted herself into a corner there, and was forced to backtrack. Prail hadn’t planned on giving the players the options to exit their cars, but after the level editor was completed, she thought better of it.

It was almost pure suicide, exiting your vehicle in a game in which the object was to run people over, but she’d been monitoring the motivations of her alpha-testers, and had discovered a few quirks. Some of the end-users were thinking about strategies that involved exiting their vehicles, and were frustrated that they could not, so of course that became high on the feature list. Frustrated gamers quit playing, and games only existed when they were being played, for the most part.

Prail wanted her games to be the best ever.

The other interesting quandary was that much like being the car in Monopoly, everyone wanted to be either Frankenstein or Machine Gun Joe Viterbo. She would allow only one instance of each per game. Without that limitation, she invariably ended up with four or five of one and three or four of the other.

Unacceptable, in her eyes.

She tinkered and tweaked on the other characters and cars in an effort to make them more enticing, but was limited by the parameters of the movie, to a large degree. The best she could come up with was cool choices of music on the in-game radios, and the ability to get naked and have sex while driving. Even then, she had to extend those options to the lead characters as well.

She settled it to her satisfaction by handicapping the lead characters. She simply made them the targets of the other six teams, and weighted additional problems against them: flat tires, engine trouble. Which brought her all the way back around to the necessity of fully articulated humanoids, which was a lot of work. Luckily, Prail loved to work, and she could reuse the humanoid system in future games.

Thinking about one problem led her to a breakthrough in another game. She’d figured out how to structure the writer sim. Instead of relying on A.I. or the end user’s input, she would draw upon Earth’s pool of literature, and simply keep the knowledge of their success from the player, forcing them to work hard for their art. The stories would write themselves. The player would merely make time to write and edit, and the more time and effort they devoted to their craft, the quicker they would achieve their goals.

This led her to conceive of a way to infinitely expand her planned Heavy Metal game. It was based on the animated Earth film, which allowed for sword and sorcery as well as advanced technology. It would be a fine game on its own, but Prail wanted more.

She decided to write wrappers for other MMORPGs, allowing players to visit other games. Once you tired of the Heavy Metal universe, you could visit, say, the Star Trek one, the World of Warcraft one, and so on, using the same character and interface.

Prail then decided to take a catnap. MotherBrain had arranged for her to escort President Gorlax on a tour of the Praxis facilities. She smiled and dreamed of dandelions.

Simulation:

Chapter 9 – Construction Master

Prail pulled up her editor, finally free to write games full-time. She was feeling generous and calm, so she began tinkering with Construction Master. It was, Prail thought, the ultimate guy game. You started off tasked with building a treehouse, using components gathered during subquests. The points early on were cool points, based on style and fun alone. Your avatar started out as a youth and aged as you progressed.

From there you built birdhouses, lemonade stands, doghouses and the like, earning money and skills along the way. When you were old and able enough, you entered the construction trade proper as an apprentice. The projects grew into massive hydroelectric dams, power plants and skyscrapers. No matter which discipline you chose, mason, plumber, sheetrocker, electrical, etcetera, you were expected to work your way up to project manager or superintendant. The beauty of it was the scalable complexity.

You could get lost in the endless details. Prail knew men liked to tinker, measure and count. Construction Master offered ample opportunity for that, with the advantage of being achievement based. She considered adding pissing contests and dick measuring, and decided against it. Beyond the craftsman aspect, you needed planning, budgeting and people-handling skills, if you wanted to make it to the top. You could fight and argue to your heart’s content, if that was your thing. She was especially proud of the bathroom subgame Johnnie on the Spot, which let you do custom graffiti in private outhouses.

She was secretly collecting the best drawings and bits of doggerel from the beta testers. To her amazement and amusement, the end users formed factions, alliances and political views, using the outhouses as message boards and forums for debate. It was a bit like Praxis’ MentalNet, the invisible network all Praxalians were tied into, but more crude, akin to the BBS and Internet systems of Earth2. That’s where she learned to let A.I. work for her.

What she considered her crowning achievement in that game was the fact that the in-game prices were tied to real-world prices on Earth2, giving it an unlimited lifespan and relevance. Prail loved the idea of a hands-off project that continued to evolve on its own.

Children/Action:

Prail was working on Big Top, a fun little action game for kids. It was a circus management sim, of a sort. You controlled the ringmaster of a three-ring circus. The show went on all around you, with continually changing acts in each of the three rings, as well as clowns and vendors who operated on the perimeters.

It was very entertaining just to watch. She put a lot of effort into the details, with plenty of acts and variations. All the player had to do was pass near the acts and keep them all going. The ringmaster avatar was surrounded by a green ring, his sphere of influence. As the levels progressed, the ring grew smaller, and the acts became more involved. It was rather like spinning plates on poles. Eventually, it became too much to manage.

Then the fun really began. Lions ran wild. Trapeze artists fell. Clown cars crashed and caught fire. In the worst case scenario, the tent itself erupted into flames. And it was deliberately unwinnable. Her favorite character was a demented clown with a sock puppet on his hand.

She made a mental note using a Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Post-It to add a circus level to Reaper Madness, and wondered how President Gorlax’s illness was doing.

I do have one last game design I've been pondering for a while, but I feel that one deserves some concept art, and an article of its own. If you ever do decide to pursue one of these designs, drop me a note, I'd gladly involve myself. The excerpts are from 'Perfect Me', an homage to the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series, albeit with a darker, more American edge. If you'd like to read it, or the sequel 'Cure for Sanity', they are available on Amazon, and will soon be released by the Wetworks imprint of J. Ellington Ashton Press.

https://www.amazon.com/Perfect-Me-Perfection-Labs-Book-ebook/dp/B006FXE1OC

Of course, if you don't want to spend a whopping $.99 for the ebook, you can always get a free Kindle review copy here:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B5IGQRmdxOyuS2R5dXNJbkJ5Zk0?ddrp=1

Thanks for reading this. All four of you. I'd love your comments, feedback, and perhaps to even hear of your own personal game designs below.

Swap - The Greatest Keystroke Innovation That Never Happened

Cut, copy, and paste. They are deeply ingrained into word processor/personal computer culture. They are probably the first keyboard shortcuts anyone learns. They are efficient and useful. What would we do without them?

What if I told you that there was a fourth, unimplemented keyboard editing shortcut that could have saved countless hours throughout the lifespan of computers?

Cut, copy, paste, and...swap.

The ability to swap selected text with buffered (copied) text would save a lot of needless copying and pasting. This is particularly useful when filling out webforms and editing documents, and is far more useful than merely pasting buffered text and losing the underlying replaced text.

Linux could be the first to add this feature, which is probably my greatest contribution to computer science. Simple, useful, effective - Swap. Tell a friend.

Organization is Happiness - Preaching to the Quire

I've recently become something of an evangelist for a piece of software, because it's just so damn good.

I needed a hierarchical, user-friendly, group-enabled checklist. After a fair amount of research and evaluating, I found Quire. I haven't been this happy with a piece of productivity software in quite a while. I'm convinced that Quire usage is part of the path to success.

It's an app. It's a webpage. It's free. It's extremely powerful, focused, and great at what it does.

After a quick and painless sign-up, you're able to create projects. If you want to get ahead in life, make projects for everything. Everything.

Each project consists of top-level entries, with an infinite (?) amount of sub-entries available. With sub-entries for your sub-entries, if you need. And so on.

Specifically, I have something like 1000 isometric drawing packages to track, each of which are fairly complicated, to a degree. Each needs verified completion to move on to the next stage of the construction project. That's my job.

Every iso exists at a specific elevation, in a specific module. And each of them has a myriad of items that can be missing, or incorrect. This is normally tracked on paper. Lots and lots of paper. Most of which exists in the form of multiple copies.

To hell with that.

I made a 3000 pipe rack project. Then I made an entry for each module. In those, I made an entry for each elevation. In each elevation, I made an entry for each iso associated with it.

Each iso entry can now have each problem tracked within it. Organization problem solved. When a line is sold off to QC, the entire entry can be checked off. Then each elevation. Then each module.

It's incredibly powerful, and is a huge innovation for what we do. It's too bad I'm the only person at work who uses it. So many questions could be answered for my bosses if they would just...look. Oh, well. Lead, follow, or get out of the way.

So...many...features. You can get notifications for new entries and completed items. Statistical data in the form of charts and percentages. You can assign tasks to specific people or groups, and attach deadlines. Did I mention the entries are draggable and droppable?

It's easy to add a new person to a project, all you need is their email address. Of course, you can assign levels of access, and people can only view the projects they're added to.

We now use Quire for everything from budgeting, auto maintenance, toy collecting, to grocery shopping. There is literally no limit to what can be done with this very satisfying piece of software.

Download it. Use it. Prosper. Quire.

https://quire.io/

Announcing the Llamatron Arcade Mini

OMG, OMG, OMG, It's here!

If you're not familiar with Robotron 2084, and the glorious Jeff Minter creation Llamatron, piss right off.

Just kidding.

Robotron was a dual-joystick arcade game from Williams, written by Eugene Jarvis, an amazingly foul-mouthed coder responsible for so many arcade hits, it's not funny. 

Llamatron 2112, though...

Llamatron was an Amiga shareware take on Robotron released by another gaming god, Jeff Minter. It takes the insanity of Robotron and cranks the knobs to eleven. Llamas! Camels! Erm, Coke Cans! Zippy the Pinhead? From there it gets weird.

It really was a big bloody deal on the Amiga (and Atari computers, as well. But they can sod off. Just kidding guys. Truce?) I mean, like, wow. Just reading the text file was an adventure. It is estimated that 39,000 pounds of weed were smoked by people playing Llamatron back in the days. There is talk of an island cult built around it.

It was just so freakin' cool.

To be honest, we pirated the Amiga to death, we loved it so much. While I'm sure Jeffy got a few quid for it, he also got a lifetime of worship, admiration, and devotion that continues to this day. Case in point, MY FREAKING LLAMATRON MINI!

I'm a terrible fanboy. I have been talking to my heroes, off and on, for thirty years, now, some of them. Sometimes they even respond! Since I know I didn't send money overseas for this game (or any other game!), I thought the best way to show my appreciation to Jeff would be to commission this Raspberry Pi-based mini, one of a kind. Unique in all the world. Just like Jeff.

Now, the guy who worked on it with me has asked me to keep him anonymous. Something about smegging taxes, copyrights, and dross like that. I sympathize. And, if you look, you can find him, or someone like him.

This guy worked with me very closely on this thing, and did everything to spec. Not only do I not begrudge him the tidy, nay, princely sum I paid for it, I paid him a little extra. It's that cool.

Oh, he's not an Amiga guy (he is now...), so we hit a snag or two. The loader doesn't work like standard emulator ROMs do, it launches into Workbench. Guess what? I love Workbench! It gives it an air of authenticity. Poor guy, I overwhelmed him with so much research material in the design and testing phase, he had to beg off.

But here it is, the crown jewel of my gaming collection. I am as happy as a Llama in Wales.

Jeff, if you're out there, thank you! If you ever want me to have one sent to you, please let me know. It's the least I can do.

Another big thank you to everyone involved in the creation of the Amiga, the Amiga scenesters themselves, Newtek alumni, and Eugene Jarvis, of course. I'm so jazzed, I'm starting work on my first dual-joystick game design. And when I get something playable, I'll get an arcade mini made for it. How cool would that be?

Game Review: Static Overdrive for Android (By Coded Games)

 

I generally don't play games on my phone. But an indie game designer/author (Robert Cordingly - https://twitter.com/CodedGames) on Twitter sent me a link, so I decided to give this one a try, and promised him a review. Luckily for both of us, it's a fun, playable, graphically-pleasing scrolling shooter.

I've always been skeptical of phone games because of control issues. This eliminates that concern by allowing you to play with a single thumb. So, nice work, there. I got a quote from a company in Mexico to develop one of my designs for mobile, but I ultimately decided against it because I didn't really like the feel of dual virtual joysticks.

There's no fluff like plot or cut screens. The game just asks if you want sound and music (a bonus as far as features go, saving you from having to turn your phone down in some situations), and then jumps you into gameplay.

If you like Galaga, Moon Cresta, Xevious, and, more importantly, bullet dodging games like Raiden, you'll probably like Overdrive. It starts off slowly. Like, almost frustratingly slow. But after the first wave, you're treated to an unexpected warp that leaves you with three upgrade options. The upgrades include speed, so it's probably your best first choice.

It's all very pleasant, graphically. It would have wowed you at the arcade in the 80s, for sure. Which is cool, considering he gives the game away for free. The background nebulae/starfields are easy on the eyes, and the warp sequences are visually engaging.

The enemies are pretty original looking. That's hard to achieve in this day and age, where we assume everything has been done before. It's not long before things get frantic. Luckily, the power-ups come often, and the gameplay is pretty balanced. When you do die, you're treated to a shield that protects you, and kills anything it comes in contact with, for nearly ten seconds. This could even be employed as a strategy of sorts, I suppose.

There's also a funky techno soundtrack. All in all, it reminds me of some great Amiga games from back in the days. That's definitely a good thing. For further research, I let my wife, a self-described NGPP (non-game playing person) give it a go. She politely lasted two levels, and said she liked it. So there's that.

I have absolutely no criticism to offer here, in the negative sense. As someone who has some idea of how much work goes into creating something like this, I have to hand it to Coded Games for giving this thing away. I would easily pay $.99-$3.00 for something like this, if I played games on my phone regularly. And, as it stands, it's staying on there. There's a lot of replay value in something like this.

Bravo.

There is a typo on the end screen when you finally lose all your ships, where it says 'arroy keys'. So, there's my contribution to development. Thanks for the great game! I look forward to your next releases. Until then, I'll keep playing this one when I have a few free moments not occupied by social media.

Get it on the Google Play store here: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.codedgames.overdrive#details-reviews or on the Apple Store for iPhone/iPad: https://itunes.apple.com/us/developer/robert-cordingly/id1330284383?mt=8

There are more games by Robert here: http://codedgames.com/buy-html5-games/

Support indie programmers!

Incredible Audiobook Narrators

The https://www.ACX.com/ audiobook market is a great thing. Audiobooks used to cost a small fortune to produce and distribute. They were just for the big publishers. But the advent of the internet changed all of that, of course. Now, pretty much anyone can get a professional audiobook published online for...nothing.

Royalty sharing allows you to split audiobook profits 50/50 with the narrator. Or you can hire actual Hollywood voice actors for the cost of a few hundred dollars, in many cases.

Funny story: I felt bad about the great people that took profit sharing jobs for me, when I realized my books were probably never going anywhere. So I tried to strike a few deals for paid narrators. Every single deal like that fell apart. It turns out that some of them, at least, are get rich quick opportunists who bail when you start sending them extensive lists of edits.

Hmmmm.

But, as luck would have it, I had a few narrators that seemed to really get my work, and were happy to do royalty share agreements. And they pretty much turned out to be great audiobooks. The few minor deficiencies were all on my part. Don't expect someone to necessarily know how to pronounce 'Nyarlhotep' or something without coaching. At the very least, be sure and check every second of every audiobook before publishing...no matter how in love with the narrator you are.

Having said all of that, here are four narrators I would highly recommend, work with again, and even pay upfront for narration services.

Tom Rockwell (Zombie Killa - https://www.amazon.com/Zombie-Killa/dp/B00FW1Q15A)

Tom is a comedian/funny songwriter/sometimes nerd rapper, so it was entirely fitting that he narrate ZK, which is full of real world people that we both know. He's a long-time devotee of Dr. Demento, and works tirelessly on FUMP (http://www.thefump.com/), the Funny Music Project. He's just great to listen to, enthusiastic, and an all-around great guy. If your book is humor based, I would check out Tom first.

Shandon Loring - (Six Stories Short & Sweet - https://www.amazon.com/Six-Stories-Short-Sweet/dp/B009AFJ3KE/, Poetry: A Love Story - https://www.amazon.com/Poetry-A-Love-Story/dp/B00B0HYNKK/, Six More Short Stories - https://www.amazon.com/Six-More-Short-Stories-Sweet/dp/B00BXQ7JLS/)

Shandon is also a great guy, and an early supporter of mine. He's the master of the southern drawl, and can read with a good deal of emotion. That's why he works so well on my poetry book and romantic short stories. His delivery of Big Top, by far my most popular short story of all time, is a big reason why it was so well-received. He's super supportive, and great to work with.

Kenneth Lee - (Hurricane Regina - https://www.amazon.com/Hurricane-Regina/dp/B00AU5SDNQ/)

Just wow. The amount of thought and work that Ken put into Hurricane Regina boggles my mind. HR is an old school Sci-Fi/Fantasy novel, and required someone who fit that vein of writing. He delivered in spades. Damn if he doesn't make me feel like a decent writer. If you like Clive Cussler, Robert Heinlein, Isaac Asimov, this is the voice of that style of writing. But, better yet, not only did he nail the hell out of this novel as a narrator, he actually looked up The Sugarcubes' "Hit" and sang the lyrics correctly, all on his own. I love this guy.

Molly Elston - (Perfect Me - https://www.amazon.com/Perfect-Me-Perfection-Labs/dp/B00BSX9CJI/)

Oh. My. God. Perfect Me is my Americanized tribute to Douglas Adams, whom I grew up reading. Turns out, people were terribly offended that I would dare even make reference to his universe. But the first second I heard Molly's audition, I was sold. British! Her accent is so lovely, and her wit so dry, she transformed my novella into a fairly spectacular audiobook. I sincerely hope to work with her again on the sequel, no matter the cost. She's just that good. I would propose to her, provided my wife is okay with that...

So, there you have it. Four incredible narrators, and all I had to do was bleed onto some paper. Now that I have a bit of crypto-investment money, I plan on sending them each a little bonus this year for the work they did, all for some royalties that really didn't amount to much. But, by all means, if you have a narration project in mind, consider these four. They're probably the brightest point in my career as an author.