Sidney Blaylock Jr.'s Blog, page 44
March 23, 2018
A Culture of Spoilers
Apologies for not posting yesterday (my first missed post of the month–boo!), but I simply ran out of time. I wanted to make sure that I finished my project (which I was able to do–yay!), but in order to do it well, I just couldn’t do it and the normal blog post as well. However, today I’m back–so on with the regularly scheduled blog post.
Spoilers
In the past couple of weeks, I have seen tons of spoilers online. It as if there has been an uptick in the amount spoilers out there. No, I take that back, actually spoilers have always been online every since it became a thing, but now, it seems that people either going out of their way to spoil things or they have become less inclined to guard themselves from spoiling something.
What’s Worse than Game of Thrones for me? Spoilers, that’s What.
A case in point–I’m not a huge fan of Game of Thrones (you might even say that I’m an anti-fan of it, wishing there was a Lord of the Rings equivalent without all the exploitative sex & violence featured on the show). However, I keep myself from spoilers from the show (and others like it that I dislike, like say The Walking Dead) in the off-chance that I ever want to see the series in their entirety for school (I am a Rhetoric & Composition/Popular Culture student after all), or for some other reason. I want to able to watch them without knowing/being able to guess major plot points based on clues and hints which weren’t in the major narrative.
Yet, in the past couple of weeks, I had a major plot point spoiled and know the name of a major character who will die on the show. Now, here’s the important bit: how did I learn about this? Was I cruising GoT fan forums? No. Was I looking a Reaction Videos from the show? No. Was I on Wikipedia, IMDB, or a site where someone mentioned it in the comments section? No. No, I was watching a Let’s Play for a video game called The Last of Us on YouTube when the Youtuber dropped the spoiler at the end of the gameplay loop while discussing a surprising development in the game. There was no warning–I guessed the spoiler was coming a sentence before it was uttered, but I couldn’t get to my phone’s volume controls in time and I had a major character’s death spoiled–including when it occurs in the show’s timeline, so there’s absolutely no suspense left at all regarding that character.
The Quest for Views/Hits/Clicks/Whatever
A similar thing has been happening on YouTube for a while where YouTubers are often posting “spoilery” things in their “Thumbnail” images that go out to promote their videos. There is a video game called Nier Automata that I really want to get and play later in the year when I’ve cleared some of my backlog of games. It is supposed to have multiple endings with a mind-blowing reveal. However, somebody thought it would be “fun” to post that ending in his/her thumbnail in the form of Hey what did you think about [this incredibly important topic that happens at the END OF THE GAME]?
Really?
The YouTuber knows full well that the video is not going out to just subscribers to his/her channel, but to anyone who YouTube’s algorithms think in a good match (that’s how these videos get so many views–not from subscribers but those who are tangentially/incidentally targeted because YouTube thinks the content is similar to what you’ve already watched). This is pervasive in the Web arena as well–clicks/likes = revenue, so being all spoilery some is a legitimate tactic (in their minds) to enhance traffic and to bring people in, but it has the opposite affect on me.
To quote a famous queen–“I do not approve.” To all those would be spoilers out there: if you want to spoil something–great, but please, give those of us who would rather enjoy the story on our terms the time (& ability) to leave your content before you do so.
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
March 21, 2018
Working on a Project for School
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So, having posted everyday this month, some might have noticed that my posts have been posting later and later in the day. So sorry about that–for this past week, I’ve either been sick or brainstorming for two projects that I have (one tomorrow, Thurs. 3/22 and the other on Mon, 3/26). I’ve been working really hard on them, esp. the one for Thursday and I’ve let the blog slid a bit. Unfortunately, it won’t get appreciably better until at least April where I have a little more “space,” but even then I have an Annotated Bibliography and 2 papers to write (in addition to a Final Exam). So, in other words, April may be “touch-and-go” as well. So please, bear with me as school exerts its inexorable hand and causes the blog to a little more “spotty” than normal. Push comes to shove, I’ll try my best to get a shorter entry (like this one) out as a “update” as to what is happening, but the longer blog entries (like the one I wanted to write on Spoilers which I have outlined and ready to write for today) will just have to wait for a more “convenient” (i.e., less project intensive) time. Sorry!
Now back to your regularly scheduled program (or in this case, my “break” is over, back to getting that project done for tomorrow’s class).
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
March 20, 2018
Project Poet (formerly Project OPaK) Underway!
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The Play’s the Thing
So, right now, one of the classes that I’m taking is a class on Early English Drama (before Shakespeare) as one of my required courses in the program. I had a story that relied on a “Poet” who told stories, but when I learned that playwrights during the early dramatical development were also called “poets” and that playwright was a bit of a pejorative term (to indicate them as a lowly profession like wheelwright or wainwright), I decided to make the main character a “Poet” who wrote a play. From there, the basic story that was in my head will play out for “Project Poet.” This story, while a Fantasy story, doesn’t include magical elements, which is unusual for me. I’m not sure (at this point) if it will even have a sword fight or combat. Think of it as a sort of “medieval Law and Order.”
To Thine Own Self Be True
While I’ve drawn a fantasy map of the country and have a brief history of the world (only about a generation or so–nothing on the level of Tolkien’s massive Silmarillion), but still it is important to the story so I wrote it out. However, what I’m really trying hard to focus on creating a set of memorable characters. I’ve been trying to really increase my characters over this past year and this is just a continuation of the process. I want to have 3 really strong and memorable characters in this story–the protagonist, the antagonist and the main supporting character. I’m focusing hard to try to make sure that I give each of them strong character traits and emotional beats in the story rather than focusing all my efforts on plot.
What’s Next?
So my next project will be “Project Scholar.” So Project Scholar is a Science Fiction story that deals with an “alien” planet (not Earth, but with Earth-like humans) who face an world ending event and only a scholar can save them. I’ve had this idea for a while, but only recently (within the last couple of years) decided to write out a bit of the backstory and rough draft. Over Christmas Break an idea of how the character might actually look/act appeared, so I’m going to try to write it and see what happens. I already have a rough outline for the action–now I need/want to the develop the character more and see what type of character he is.
Work also continues on Ship of Shadows Graphic Novel after a long hiatus. I’m currently alternating between 250 words a day between the two projects (Project Poet & Ship of Shadows Graphic Novel) and I’ll update everyone via the blog whenever I finish these two creative writing projects (in their current drafts, at least).
Well, that’s all I have time for today. Have a great day!
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
March 19, 2018
What’s on My Bookshelf: The Dragonbone Chair by Tad Williams
Okay, so The Dragonbone Chair by Tad Williams is one of my favorite Fantasy novels of all time. I used to read it all the time when I was younger and would revel in the world that Tad created. I don’t read it nearly as often these days, but I still enjoy it–so much, in fact, that I still have my original paperback copy and the current trade paperback edition of this work as well. I reread the trilogy fairly recently (within the last five years), but the story is starting to get a bit haze, so it may be time for a reread soon, before I do a deep dive into Tad’s new trilogy set in this world.
Fantasy and the High School Student
So I’ve always been into Fantasy and Science Fiction books, so much so that I remember the story behind finding this book. I was graduating high school in a few months and our school wanted us to experience and visit multiple colleges. I chose the Southeast region and we covered schools in the Chattanooga, North Georgia, and Atlanta Georgia area. Rather than just a simple college tour, we also got to visit a couple of Atlanta museums and malls as well during our brief 2 or 3 (?) day stay. We visited several colleges and universities, museums, and malls. One mall that we happened to go to was The Underground in Atlanta (which, after a quick google search, which sadly no longer exists, unfortunately. There were tons of shops and vendors and, of course, I found a cool-looking bookstore. Browsing the shelves, I happened to see the cover of the Dragonbone Chair and I bought it even though I had brought Raymond Feist’s fantasy series to read on the trip.
A Life-Long Reader of the Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn Trilogy
This book is the first book in the Memory, Sorrow, and Thorn trilogy (okay, sometimes there are 4 books, but that is because book 3 was so massive that it was often split into 2 separate paperback books so as not to have a flimsy paperback that would fall apart due to the length). It tells the story of Simon, who is an absent-minded youth in realistically realized fantasy world based on (in this book) a combination of a late medieval world based on English-myth (think Prester John) and Norse mythology (think the Norns). Its world-building is some of the best, but it takes its time starting the story. While the early story is a great character study of Simon, there is a plot twist that happens that forces Simon out on his own by himself. The story slows down here, but it is only temporary because once he finds a companion in Binabik, the story ramps up slowly, but insistently to its ultimate conclusion which, while I won’t spoil, was really satisfying to me.
This is one of my favorite fantasy novels from my childhood. While I did not read this one on the way back from the trip as I intended, when I finished Raymond Feist’s series, I was able to start on this over that weekend and I remember devouring it in under a week. It was that good of a book for me!
Anyway, sorry this post is late, but I’ll try to do better the rest of the week. No promises though as I have a project due later this week–fingers crossed (on both accounts)!
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
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March 16, 2018
Remembering Stephen Hawking
Still frame from a NASA movie (Image Source: Phys.org, click on image for more info.)
This blog post won’t be a long one–it is just a short remembrance of Stephen Hawking who passed away earlier this week. My interest in Hawking’s work came because I’m interested–no, fascinated–by Black Holes. Even before I saw the Disney movie Black Hole, I had encountered them in children’s astronomy books that I’d checked out from the library–and a popular science paperback that I bought from the library’s book-sale.
Every so often, I would see the name Stephen Hawking appear/pop-up in relation to something Black Hole related. So, in the pre-Internet days of my childhood (Internet existed, but not something that consumers could access), I didn’t really know who he was. However, in the mid-80s, his popularity grew from Academics into Popular Culture and I started seeing him on PBS shows related to science like Nova (this is where I saw him the most), Sixty Minutes, and even on episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation, so I got to see him and understand his importance to science.
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I have his book, A Brief History of Time, but while I’ve gotten to Chapter 2 or 3, I have to admit, it starts off with a discussion of Newtonian Physics and the history of cosmology (as I recall), but what I was after was the information on, you guessed it, Black Holes, so I stopped reading. I will pick it back up–I’m going to try to make finishing it this year a goal.
Anyway, I just wanted to say, that I while I did not ever get a chance to see, meet, or hear Stephen Hawking in person, he did touch my life tangentially through our shared fascination with Black Holes and their inherent properties, and thanks to the power of television, both PBS shows like Nova and more popular fare like Star Trek the Next Generation, I really got to feel like I knew Mr. Hawking quite well.
You will be missed!
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
March 15, 2018
The State of Destiny (Destiny 1 and Destiny 2)
Today, I want to quickly talk about the video game series Destiny and its current slate of games (Destiny and Destiny 2). After a strong start, Destiny 2 is currently in free-fall with its players. Many hardcore players are leaving for other games. The original Destiny supposedly had a slow start, but found its footing after the release of the Taken King. Those of you who read the blog from the beginning know that for the longest time, I had a Destiny countdown clock widget on the side of the blog. I was an avid Destiny player. However, Bungie, the creators have made a few mistakes that have caused me to fall away–but they aren’t the same mistakes that the current “narrative” would have you believe so I’ll cover what I think are a couple of the biggest ones.
“Shared World Shooter” vs “MMO”
Bungie was quick to point out that Destiny wasn’t an MMO (which has certain connotations in the game community), but was rather a “Shared World Shooter” (implying that it was a shooter first and that it was a shared world between you and other players). You could intersect with other players or go “lone wolf.” Well, that appealed to me–however, in actuality, the game functioned like an MMO. You needed a “crew” to do the best missions, The Raids. The content they added changed the game and the paradigm, and they kept tinkering with the game mechanics, rather than creating new (better) content to flesh out the world. They “sold” the game in marketing one way, but the presented the game in practice another.
“Vanilla” Destiny was actually better than “Taken King” Destiny
So this is one where the majority of Destiny players and I part ways: “Vanilla” Destiny, before all the myriad of changes, was actually pretty good. Bungie got too involved in listening to criticisms and changed the game based on people who had left rather than those who stayed. Their goal all the way through The Taken King seemed to be to “recapture” those who had left the game rather than on those who had stayed. Those who stayed just wanted more story. Had Bungie prioritized that over changing weapon balancing, fixing “cheeses” to bosses (ways of defeating boss characters in ways unintended by the developers), etc., I don’t think Destiny series would be in the position that it is. They made a different mistake with Destiny 2, but the result was the same. They focused on story in Destiny 2, but forgot that the players wanted compelling content for the endgame (additions that I didn’t care for, but seemed to resonate with other members of the hardcore Destiny community–such as Trials of Osiris). Destiny 2 should have included all the major components of Destiny and added new components to satisfy gamers until the next major expansion, but this didn’t happen–they went back to changing systems and mechanics that worked perfectly fine in Destiny, such as having two primary weapons, etc.
Here’s an example of Destiny 2 gameplay (PvP) from a high-level, highly skilled player, “Ms. 5000 Watts”:
The Social Network is not always Right.
The point that I’m trying to make is that by listening to the vocal fans who don’t even play the game and trying to create a game for them, Bungie lost focus and helped to dilute the game for those who were still playing. I no longer play Destiny because of the multitudinous game currencies, not getting enough story and answers about the The Traveler and The Darkness. I’m sorry, but I’m not all that interested in the “Lore” of the Guardians–The Curse of Osiris DLC, I’m looking at you–I want to find out what the Traveler and why its Light is gone and how I can “heal” it and I want to find out what the Darkness is, why it hates the Traveler and what I can do to stop it. I want to be able to do that on my own or with a team of 3-6 players (no less–sorry to inform you Bungie—Destiny is only fun by yourself or with a full”fire-team” because that’s how you designed it. Those 2 player events are annoying! To be honest, anything under a full 6 players is not really ideal, but I understand how hard it could be to get 6 players together to do all the content, but Bungie really should be designing with 1, 3, and 6 player/players in mind).
Basically, if anyone at Bungie reads this post, please stop listening to the forums and start listening to the people who actually play the game and to your own designers. The people who have left the game and who are “slagging you off” in the comments are never going to be satisfied with what you create–no matter how good it is. Your best bet is to follow the original creative vision you had to tell an epic story about The Traveler and The Darkness and let the fans who are really invested follow you along for the ride!
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
March 14, 2018
The Trouble with Villains
Each week, a YouTube channel that I subscribe to called Digital Trends puts out a couple of different podcasts. They are a tech-based show, covering Home Entertainment, Home Theater, Laptops, HDTVs, Smart Home/Smart Speakers, etc., so their content, including podcasts are mostly tech-focused. However, one of their podcasts, Between the Streams is a fun, “end-of-the-week” look at the happenings in movies, entertainment, etc. As someone whose 2nd Academic speciality is probably going to be Popular Culture, I find myself tuning in more often than not. In the latest episode, BTS 093, they mentioned villains and how they “love” a good villain.
Generation Shift
Okay, so this is probably where the generations have diverged in culture. Baby Boomers and Gen X’ers (like myself), tend to prefer heroes (John McClain, Han Solo/Luke Skywalker, MacGyver, Hercule Poirot, etc). We like villains, but only in so much as we want things to be challenging to the hero. For instance, Alan Rickman‘s performance as the villain in Die Hard was so tense because he was the smart enough to go toe-to-toe with Bruce Willis’ tough, no-nonsense cop John McClain, who had grit and determination. However, in the past ten years or so, I’ve heard a shift where a cool villain seems to be the only requirement now for good entertainment. They were discussing various incarnations of the The Joker, but they make no mention of various actors or incarnations of The Batman. Batman is a non-entity in his own movies. For them, it is all about the villains and the Rogue’s Gallery and that makes me sad.
“A More Wretched Hive of Scum and Villainy”–Star Wars: Episode IV, A New Hope
Let’s take Star Wars as a quick example. There are people giddy with joy over Kylo Ren and the fact that the Last Jedi has a scene (no spoilers) where he and Rey meet. They’ve even fashioned a name for the pair, “Reylo” in hopes that they will become a couple. Really? You want your hero character to become an item with someone who has murdered other people in cold blood? And let’s say that happens, then what does that say about your main character/hero? Are they then complicit in the act? Rey knew about it and knew that the character escaped justice/consequences, so would she now be tainted with the same “blood” as her murderous “boyfriend” (again, assuming the producers follow up on the “Reylo” idea). Luke is a “whiny kid” up until a turning point in his later into Star Wars and that’s all anyone ever cares to remember about him (esp. in relation to the cooler Han Solo character), but Luke’s arc is critical the successful revelation to the story because he has to deny evil in order for the story to work. If he were anything like Kylo (whom the new SW) movies seem to dote on, the whole universe would be under the power of the malevolent Emperor now, with Luke standing by the Emperor’s side dealing out murder and injustice and bathed in blood like his father before him.
“There are Always Men Like You”–Marvel’s Avengers
Not to get all us vs them generational divide, but it is that denial that is at the center of it all. Too many people today seem to want to be in power/have power even if that power comes at the expense of doing what is right. In the mind of a villain, might makes right where as in the mind of a hero doing right is a struggle to be overcome. Like Yoda said when Luke asked him about the Dark Side of the Force–“No. No. No. Quicker, easier, more seductive.” That is what villainy entails–a quicker, easier route to what you want and if that means crushing the life (sometimes literally) out of whoever is in your way, then so be it. But that doesn’t mesh with our belief that all life is unique and should be allowed to prosper in their own way. A villain says there is only one way: my way! And shouldn’t we (especially as a species–older generations and new alike) stand up and say, we reject this and we reject you!
And that’s the role of a true hero.
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
March 13, 2018
Potpourri: The Writing Life
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Today’s blog will be a short one on a few things that happened over the weekend pertaining to my writing life. These are mostly updates that I feel are important milestones, but each one isn’t really so important that it requires its own blog post. So, in no particular order, here we go:
Submitted All Tomorrow’s Children
So I submitted All Tomorrow’s Children (ATC) to its first market over the weekend. The market is a “major” market in the Science Fiction and Fantasy short fiction landscape, but I doubt they’ll accept it. While they say there never receive enough Sci-Fi (and ATC is Sci-Fi), their Acceptance rate is .09%. That means they reject 99.91% percent of the stories that are sent to them. Still, I had to try as they are one of the “new” big publishers of Sci-Fi/Fantasy stories. If the market doesn’t take ATC, I have two more publishers that I consider “big” to send it to and then I’ll step down a tier to the mid-level markets. You never know until you try.
“Blogging” My Way to 250 Words-a-Day
So, I have a confession to make. I have several Word Processors–Pages, SimpleNote (Mac App & Website), Scrivener, IAWriter App, and a couple of lesser Word Processors (and have access to Word through my school account and on their computers). However, I found over the past few weeks, that for fiction, I really just like the ease and simplicity of SimpleNote (which I’ve mentioned in the past), but also, just the WordPress Text Editor that I use to create my blog entries. While I used to draft in SimpleNote, I’ve now switched to the WordPress blog editor because I can quickly see the word count and when I reach my 250 limit for the day, I then copy and paste the work over to SN. One I have a completed draft, I then copy and paste that over to Scrivener and make my major edits there. Scrivener makes compiling a submission draft a breeze and that’s the draft I use to submit. It was this workflow that helped me to get All Tomorrow’s Children off my computer and out the door to a publisher.
Finished (FINALLY) the Rough Draft of “Project Skye”
I finished this over the weekend as well. It clocks in at about 4,000 words, but really needs some substantial TLC. This was an exploratory draft and written “by the seat of my pants” because 1) I wanted to get an idea of the character and 2) I thought I knew enough about the world in order to just write. The draft is a “poster child” for why I don’t write without outlining. There are plot threads that just drop out, there are character motivations that don’t work, there’s setting issues, there’s a storm that never develops, etc. This draft is an absolute “mess” and I will most likely have to rewrite the entire story from beginning to end rather than what I did with All Tomorrow’s Children which was “build” the story from the ground up. This illustrates the difference in my writing styles: ATC was fun to write for me, while Project Skye was an absolute slog. I can’t even show it to the Writing Center consultant to illustrate Skye’s character (which is the reason I wrote the story) because it really isn’t a “story” yet (at least, not in the way I think of “story”). But its done–that’s the best part. And what do they say? If you’re at the bottom, you can only go up from there–hopefully, by the summer, I can put together a draft that I feel proud to show off–because it isn’t there yet!
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
March 12, 2018
What’s on My Bookshelf? InFamous: Second Son (Video Game)
So today on What’s on My Bookshelf, I thought I’d highlight a video game. I know gaming is still fairly niche, but it has surpassed movies as the highest grossing entertainment genre, so I’d like to give equal time. The game, InFamous: Second Son is the 3rd game in the InFamous brand. Despite that, this feels like a “soft” reboot as the main character, setting, and supporting characters are all new, so it is a great jumping on point if you’ve never played an InFamous game. The basic gist is that, thanks to an explosion in the earlier games in the series, a few people are not so “normal” anymore and have become “super-powered.” So, essentially you get to play as a “super hero” in this game’s universe.
Characters, Setting and Plot
You play as Delsin, the younger brother to a cop. Your parents aren’t around anymore, so you’re brother has had to take care of you and like any little brother, you’re just a bit rebellious. How rebellious is up to you (see below). The game is an open world game set in Seattle. While not a one-to-one representation of the city, the game still bears a fair likeness to the city with many of Seattle’s landmarks on display (including a harrowing jaunt to the Space Needle). As a super powered individual, you get to really let loose against the enemy forces, the DUP, who want to collar ALL “super powered” characters, regardless of their motives. Add to the fact that you get to also “gain” new powers by absorbing them from other “super” characters that you face and the game gets quite inventive.
Morality
The thing I like most about the InFamous games is that they feature a morality system. Actions that help the game world bring about a positive change (citizens take pride in their city and help clean it up, etc.) or you can do the opposite (being a bully and a pest drives the city into a state of dinginess and decay). There are major choices that have this “good vs evil” paradigm along with smaller acts within the world. Overall, the story still gets to the same resolution, but the game gives you the appearance of agency to affect the outcome of the story by giving you those moments of choice.
If you’re a gamer looking for something new to play, or maybe, you want to try out gaming to see what its all about, this is a good starting point and introduction to the gaming experience. InFamous: Second Son is available for the Sony Playstation 4 video game system.
Have a great day!
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
March 9, 2018
A Bibliophile’s Dream: Data Manager 2, Goodreads, and Library Thing
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Bibliophile by Breath_Defying on DeviantArt.com (Click on Picture for more information)
So, I’ve always been a bit of a bookish person. Okay, who am I kidding, I’m an unabashed bibliophile–I love books in all their glorious forms. Ebooks, print books, trade paperbacks, mass market paperbacks, hardcovers, books with dust covers, books without dust covers, magazines, graphic novels, comic books, spiral bound books, zines, etc. If it has existed in printed form, I’ll probably love it if I get to see it. In fact, the first two places that I’m liable to visit in any new situation are the bookstores and the libraries of that town, place, or school. Technology has made reading easier and disseminating print quicker and faster. One day I might do a blog entry about that, but today I really want to turn my attention to the cataloging of books/media and some of the fun ways that I’ve done it over the years.
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Data Manager 2, Image Source: Terapeak
Data Manager 2
This is the first database program that I ever discovered. I’d been using a pen-and-paper system before I discovered this program, but once I found that I could create record using the title, author’s name, publisher, genre, etc., I was in “hog heaven.” I quickly converted my records into computer format and spent hours looking at the “Reports” function which combined the best of graphing functions of a spreadsheet program with a database program. I loved comparing authors that I had, series, or most importantly genres to see where they ranked with others that I owned. Great fun for a bibliophile!
Goodreads
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Goodreads Logo, Image Source: List Challenges (Click for more info. on List Challenges)
After Data Manager 2, I flitted from database to database on the various computers that I owned, but none seemed as satisfying as DM2. As much as rail against the whole Web 2.0 paradigm, it did bring in one good thing: Goodreads. In many ways, it is a combination between a book database and a social networking site centered around books. I have about half of my collection listed on GR along that with being a “GR Author” meaning that any of my works that are published in book form (not online) should show up (I say should because, with the variation on my name, some of the books that I’m listed in aren’t actually showing up–those periods and commas make a difference). I really GR, but find that sometimes it is too “Facebook” for me and I actively resist all the social/community features that it pushes. It has a yearly reading challenge that I like to participate in and you can really go in-depth on the types of books that you read at the end of the year with a year-end round up (pretty snazzy). They also have an app that will scan your books’ barcodes and add them to your collection, but too be honest, I think the web interface is much more intuitive.
Library Thing
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The second major site that I found is Library Thing. It is also a Web 2.0 paradigm site, but it focuses (in my opinion) more on the books aspect rather than the social aspect. Make no mistake, it has social/community features galore, but for some reason, whenever I’m there, I feel the focus is on books first, community second unless you really want to make it a community focused site. I don’t have nearly as many of my books listed there, about a 1/10th of my collection, but I’m adding books there on a weekly basis. I love that you can order the books by “shelves” (which you can also do on GR) and that you can print out a listing of books (or just the covers) by the shelves that you set up. They also recommend books to read based on your shelves (again, GR does this as well). One thing that I liked that came too late for me to use is TinyCat, a mini-library interface that you can checkout books with (sort of a mini-circulation module). This would have been perfect for my classroom library when I was a 6th grade teacher, but it was implemented until the year that I left–I tried several systems (including GR shelves), but none fit my needs like TC would have. Too bad, as even with the half solutions, I had a fair amount of buy-in with my students as “librarians.” Imagine what I could have done with a fully fleshed out check-in/check-out database that the students could have used with their Chromebooks–I would have probably had what I was looking for developing as a 6th grade language arts teacher–a class of readers who would also share my love for books and reading.
Well, that’s all for today–have a good day!
Sidney
Read Skin Deep for Free at Aurora Wolf
Read Childe Roland for Free at Electric Spec
Read Faerie Knight in the anthology Fae, Rhonda Parrish, Ed. or the Kindle Edition
Read Ship of Shadows in the anthology Visions IV: Space Between Stars, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read WarLight in the anthology Visions VI: Galaxies, Carrol Fix, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
Read Dragonhawk in the magazine Tales of the Talisman, Vol. 8, Iss. 3, David Lee Summers, Ed. or the Kindle Edition.
