Sawyer Paul's Blog, page 37
August 15, 2018
Draft Actions to make
Draft Actions I’d like to make, and am thinking about sending them money so I can be a pro user and make them:
Date: There’s a Date and Time action that works great, but I really just need the date, without the day. “August 16, 2018”, to be exact.
A keyboard icon that gives me a ”.txt” or ”.md” for file extensions
A keyboard icon that gives me my blog’s Dropbox folder address.
Gyroscope Health
I liked the idea of this app. You give it access to your motion and it can sync into various services (even your music history and pc time tracking) to give you an idea of your health and mood throughout the day. And I’m sure for people on phones with beefier batteries, it might be awesome. But on my teeny iPhone SE, I was feeling severe battery drains. I’ll come back to this app if I ever get a bigger device.
August 13, 2018
Cura, August 14, 2018
Note: The playlist embedded above will always be the most recent playlist and might not match the list below.
Cura is my Spotify mixtape. You can listen to it and subscribe here. I keep it as one playlist so it’s easy to subscribe to. I update it fairly frequently, but I also keep an archive playlist so you don’t have to miss a thing.
I hope you like it. I made it for you.
Here’s the track listing for this week:
How Did This Happen !? By BODEGA
Mallrats (La La La) By The Orwells
Too High By Bass Drum of Death
All My Friends Were Punks By Beach Day
August 2, 2018
Cura, August 3, 2018
Cura is my Spotify mixtape. You can listen to it and subscribe here. I keep it as one playlist so it’s easy to subscribe to. I update it fairly frequently, but I also keep an archive playlist so you don’t have to miss a thing.
I hope you like it. I made it for you.
Here’s the track listing for this week:
girls - girl in red
Poor Boy - Belle & Sebastian
1950 - King Princess
Kind of Human - M. Ward
Take it All - Lisa Prank
Best Friend - Rex Orange County
Melt Your Heart - Jenny Lewis
Sick of Losing Soulmates - dodie
I Really Like It - Bedroom Record Our Girl
Mr Tembo - Damon Albarn
July 31, 2018
Plex Daily Mix
Now that I’ve rated every song in my Plex library, what’s the best way to actually enjoy this music?
Here’s my first experiment: a Plex Daily Mix. It’s 50 songs, organized with two criteria.
Songs I haven’t listened to in the last month
Songs with fewer than 3 plays.
Songs that have been rated.
This is a pretty simple smart playlist, but because it updates every time I play a song (because of the first criteria) and won’t repeat too often (because of the second), this playlist will only ever empty if I never add new music to my collection. It’s also songs I’ve already decided to keep, so my mind isn’t distracted by thinking “do I want to keep this one?”
This is the kind of stuff I’ve always wanted from iTunes, but they had to go and break smart playlists a few years ago and now nobody trusts it to work.
Other playlists I’d like to make:
Songs that have been skipped more than three times (for the purpose of lowering their stars)
Genre smart playlists (a bit like my Spotify lists)
I’ll probably add/delete to this over time.
July 29, 2018
Octopath Traveler and buying a game in 2018
Octopath Traveler costs $88 Canadian Dollars after tax. This is the price of “big” games on the Switch, and it’s the first one I’ve bought with money. I picked up Splatoon 2 when I got the Switch back in March, but the trade-in value for other games I had took care of that one. With Octopath, I gave Nintendo my credit card and they took $88 Canadian Dollars.
I’ve spent more then $88 on the Switch. I bought Sonic Mania, Celeste, Thumper, Blossom Tales, and other games. These ranged from $10-30, and I considered all of them money well spent. I’ve been very happy with the Switch so far. It’s full of games that feel like updated and well-designed versions of games I liked (and wanted to buy) as a kid. Octopath Traveler is the next game to establish this pattern. If Sonic Mania is an updated version of the Sonic games from the early 90s, then Octopath is an updated version of the turn-based adventure games from that period. So why is Sonic $25 and Octopath $88? Probably for the same reason that Sonic 1 on the iPhone is free with ads, and Final Fantasy IX on the iPhone is $30. Sega and Square Enix do business a little differently.
The main thing I’ve found interesting so far with Octopath is how long it took me to decide whether or not I was actually going to buy it. $88 is a lot of money, but I usually know if I want a video game or not.
Two Demos
Octopath Traveler had a demo available that let you play the first part of two characters’ story. I played the Primrose intro, and found myself not really enjoying it all that much. I didn’t give it a chance.
Back in the 90s, I used to love demos. In leau of renting a game, they were the best way to decide whether or not to play a game. Demos don’t work with every game, but they’re fantastic for RPGs, because they’re generally really long. The demo for Final Fantasy VIII was so desired that Square made you buy another full game just to play it.
The first demo didn’t do much for me, but the second demo, which let you basically begin the real game and play for three full hours, did a lot to change my mind. I was able to finish two of the characters’ initial missions in that time, and it gave me an idea of how the combat worked. It also contained a stroke of marketing genius: your three hours would count towards the real game, so you wouldn’t have to play it again.
Youtube
I’ve watched a handful of Octopath videos. Almost every game youtube channel I follow has made more than one, and the ideas portrayed in the videos are varied and interesting. This is novel for Youtube, where most video game videos involve idiots screaming. Tim Rogers of Kotaku made a whole video about just one random encounter:
Videos like this are great because they show that the simplest parts of the game can be deep and engaging. They’re better at advertising the game than almost anything Square Enix has done.
Then there’s Mike Mahardy of GameSpot, who made a video about some of the weaknesses of the game, and how the transparent battle system is what makes up for the lacklustre narrative cohesion in the game:
Videos like these let me know that there are rough spots in the game, and then I can decide if those rough spots are enough to detract a purchase.
Finally, there’s Digital Foundry, who uploaded a video about frame rates, art direction, and how the game’s visual style is more difficult than it appears.
I likely wouldn’t have noticed some of these details without having seen this video. These three videos all sold me on various aspects of what I’ll be experiencing, and let me know in advance anything that might be a downer, without actually spoiling any plot points or fine details of the gameplay.
False Nostalgia
I actually never played any Super Nintendo RPGs, because I could never afford them. I played RPGs on the Playstation largely becaue they were cheaper than SNES games. But I wanted to play the SNES ones, and I still kind of want to now. I’ve began Final Fantasy VI maybe five times, but I always lose interest because I know it’ll always be there. Same with Chrono Trigger. Octopath feeds into that nostalgia, or even just the nostalgia of wanting, by giving the player that retro feel while also being a brand new game with actual graphical punch.
Bravely Default
It’s only really a footnote in its history, but Octopath Traveler plays a lot like Bravely Default, a solid RPG on the 3DS. Its character structure and battle system are very similar, and I remember enjoying Bravely Default a great deal. As sad as it is, I tend to buy games I already know I’ll enjoy. I’m less experimental than I used to be (at least at this price range).
The thing that ultimately changed my mind though is that I wanted to play more. I knew there would only be so many quality videos. I knew the demo was only so long. And I wanted more, and wanting more means ponying up.
I hope it’s good.
July 28, 2018
Morning Pages, July 29, 2018
There wasn’t much dance left, so I went up to the roof to get high.
I sat sat five feet from Jillian, who barely acknowledged me at first. I didn’t much care either. i came up here to be alone, to stare off, and think about anything but the future. I heard her giggle. It got darker. From the roof, he could see lots of other roofs, but not much else. The horizon went on for a while. My first joint was too small to continue, and so I stomped it and started another one. Look, I’m not going to sorry for myself forever, but I am going to feel sorry for myself for at least one more joint.
High School was over. In the span of eight hours, I’d had sat in my last class, gone to my last high school dance, heard the Spin Doctors, and my girlfriend dumped me in front of everybody.
But then it didn’t end. It had happened too early in the night to truly matter. It was an opening act, a reminder that school dances were bottle episodes of drama. Not enough oxygen in the air, and too many people thinking this would be the last time they’d all see one another. It was bound to happen to someone. And I’d been so tossed overboard that I didn’t even know if it had happened to anyone else. Wrapped up in my own story, I wasn’t actually sure what else happened. Did anyone hook up that weren’t together at the beginning of the night? Did anyone else break up? Who cheated on who? Who danced with the wrong partner? Who grabbed the wrong coat, with the wrong note inside? I wanted to know. This dance was meant to close down this school, and to close out some books so others would open. That’s what my English teacher said morning. Close books. Open new ones. Hall smoked and watched the stars.
July 27, 2018
Morning Pages, July 28, 2018
Tich walked up to Walt. “You know what time it is,” she said.
Walt looked at her. He heard the tempo slowing. He scoffed at first.
“You always save one for me.” She said. “It’s our tradition. Even since sixth grade.”
Walt thought back to their first dance. Mandated. Everybody pair up. It was luck. And they didn’t have to keep doing it. But some dances, he would ask her. Some dances, she would ask him. They never dated. They barely hung out. But every dance, they made sure to have one.
He followed her, and she put her arms around his shoulders and tied up her fingers behind his neck. His hands dropped to her waist.
“I love your dress,” He said. “You’re fantastic.”
Tich cocked her head a bit and took the compliment like a boss.
“So you’re into Lucy, huh?” Tich asked.
“You know,” He said, shifting his weight a little with every beat. “I sometimes wish this school wasn’t just a pile of who likes who.”
“What else is there?” Tich asked. “Besides, you’re going to miss that in uni.”
“I wouldn’t even know how to ask someone like that out,” he said.
The pace picked up slightly. They still mostly danced like they were still in middle school, but Tich couldn’t help but sway her hips a bit. There’s always that point in a slow song when it becomes faster, and nobody really knows what to do. They’d danced to this one before. It was a classic, from the early 90s. They knew it would slow down again, so they hung on.
Tess showed up out of nowhere and said “I’m so drunk you guys.” Walt laughed like an idiot, and it was pretty awkward for a moment. But then he saved it. “Fuck, me too,” he said. And they all woo’d like they were hanging out the top of a limo.
July 24, 2018
More Things, July 25, 2018
With the help of an IFTTT recipe that turns what I save to Pocket into a Markdown link, I can easily make a linked list blog post again. Hence, the return of More Things.
Articles are ordered from oldest to newest.
Canada’s Secret to Escaping the ‘Liberal Doom Loop’
I wrote the story of O
Made to Suffer for Her Sins
How Nigeria’s World Cup Jersey Became a Streetwear Grail
Hello Nasty Turns 20
It’s Not Your Fault If You Can’t Get Anything Done in the Summer
What Do Designers Think Of The Tablet UI In Westworld?
Emotionally and economically, being a sports fan sucks. So why do we do it?
A list of 25 Principles of Adult Behavior by John Perry Barlow
Escaping Twitter’s Self-Consciousness Machine
We Should Be Building Cities for People, Not Cars
We Tried To Uncover The Long-Lost ‘American Sailor Moon’ And Found Something Incredible
Jonathan Franzen Is Fine With All of It
Dwayne Johnson’s New Kind of Hollywood Masculinity
Women’s Media Is a Scam
A 4-Day Workweek Experiment Made Everyone Happier and More Productive
You don’t have to live in public
July 19, 2018
Pinout
This morning, my phone bricked while updating. I subway’d to work with only my Kobo. I read, and I listened to the noise of the train and the people around me. It was some good quality reading time. The lack of music was a novelty. It was the first time travelling silent since I’d began taking anti-depressants. And I wrote this bit on the subway too, first in my little notebook. It made me think I should do this more often. I don’t always have to shut out the world.
But if you do have to shut out the world, Pinout’s a pretty good way to do it.
I recently redownloaded Pinout, an iOS game released in 2016, because I hadn’t actually sunk my teeth into it properly. The first time around, I didn’t realize there was actually much here, because I made the mistake of only playing the free version. Paying $4 unlocks something dastardly: a saved high score.
If you play for free, you can’t save your progress, and you start at the beginning. If you pay, you can start at any level you’ve completed, and your best time will be saved.
I figured out what makes this game special. It isn’t just that Pinout is a creative reinvention of pinball. These game developers have cracked the mystery of how to entice players to replay levels.
Level one begins with 60 seconds. Level two’s time is what you have after beating level one (and so on). Getting a better time feels good, but it’s also helpful to your future self. And if you go back and play the levels again, you can improve your start time on any future level.
Pinout’s game loop is about adding more time to higher levels by playing lower levels again. The practical effect of this score improving scheme is that it gives you more time in the end-game unlimited mode. Is there and end to it? I don’t know. I haven’t yet banked enough time to get me there. But the real reason to best your scores are because they’re sitting right there, being to be bested. It starts out as nice, becomes something practical, and ends up as something nice again.
For a while, it’ll be a tempting challenge. You’ll run into your personal best on a level by level basis, and then you probably won’t play the game again. That’s what I did. Alto’s Adventure has a “zen” mode that allows traversal without the challenge and stress of the level challenges. A similar feature would be welcome here. Pinout has excellent flow. It’s a shame the clock is always running out.
When I look around the subway in Toronto, I mostly see people looking at their phones, and most of them are playing games. Well, most people are playing Candy Crush. I can’t blame them. Simply being on the subway is reason enough to want to turn off your brain. Pinout is a good game for that because, unlike Candy Crush, it ends. There is a point in the game where you will be forced to look up and think “that’s the best I can do.” And then you’ll do something else.
