You notice how Sonic was advertised. Sonic was advertised as being about speed; radical Sonic was fast, old man Mario was slow. What happened to Sonic games is: the developers drank the speed kool-Aid, they thought Sonic was about speed so they focused on speed and when that failed to produce good games they then went with gimmicks, shitty stories. From there Sonic games hit bottom until Generations (or so I heard, I haven't played it (I need a job)). They forgot what made Sonic games good and it's not speed.

Sonic was never about speed. Play the original Sonic games and you'll find that for the most part Sonic doesn't move at max speed and there are many obstacles that slows Sonic down. Most often you're exploring the levels via platforming. Yes there is some parts of the levels that rely on speed and some parts of the levels requires speed to get to but those are not the bulk of the levels. Speed in the Genesis Sonic games was a small gimmick.

Look at the level maps for the Genesis Sonic games (1, 2, 3, Sonic & Knuckles, Sonic CD). A game about speed would require simple straightforward level designs, you need simple straightforward level designed if the game is about speed because moving at higher speed gives you less time to react and make choices. The Genesis Sonic games level designs are not simple or straightforward, the levels start out more complex than Mario and most many other plantformers of the time and they get more complex as the newer games cam out. These levels don't suit them selfs for speed, they are suited for exploration and platforming.

In the early Sonic games you did get a time bonus but that time bonus was minuscule compared to the ring bonus you got. You got more points for collecting rings, collecting 100 rings gave you extra lives and getting enough points gives you extra continues. You're rewarded for collecting rings not speed running the levels. You collect rings by exploring the levels, you explore the levels primarily though platforming.

Of course there were other issues with Sonic games after the Genesis; focusing on an ever expanding roster of woodland creatures instead of Sonic the guy the games are named after, stupid poorly thought out gimmicks, bad fan fiction level writing (an anti-Sonic enemy that is a black pallet swap of Sonic, named "Shadow", who turns out not to be evil and become a darker and edger Sonic wannabe who uses guns then he gets a pallet swap enemy of his own). However I'm focusing on the speed issue here and the other problems have been talked about by others.

Conclusion: Sonic is not about speed, it's about platforming.

                          

The Simpsons; I've said for years that The Simpsons is no longer funny; that it's a zombie franchise and that it should have ended 15 years ago. Upon actually looking back at old Simpsons episodes I found that it sucked even then. The Simpsons have never actually been funny. It's not just the Simpsons. Look back at most sitcoms; Freinds was at best mildly funny until the whole relationship drama between Ross and Rachel killed what hummer the show had, Every One Loves Ramon was never funny and was just a horrible show about horrible people except the writers never realized how horrible the protagonists where, any 80's early 90's family sitcom, etc. None of these where actually funny.

Before someone says "You just don't have a sense of hummer"; I do, there are many things I find funny and yes there are a few shows that are funny. For example: Scrubs when it's not trying to be serous or trying relationship drama (how come the Big Bang Theory is the only sitcom that can do relationship drama right? until recent seasons), Big Bang Theory started out "meh", got good but then went down hill fast, Futurama, Red Green Show (if you haven't heard of it's look it up, it hilarious), Father Ted, Old SNL, In Living Color, Kids in the Hall, Sports Night (which you people didn't watch so it got canceled) and others.

The problem is the vast majority of comedies through out the history of TV have not been funny but people watched them because they really didn't have much choice. When cable came around people had a choice between new crap and old crap so they watched the new crap then cable expanded to 600 channels and people had too many choices so they stuck to what they had before; the crap. People don't turn off the TV when they can only find crap, they watch crap. When people eat the crap they make you they continue to make crap, if people would stop watching the crap, they'll start making good shows but you people continue to watch crap.
When there is nothing but crap on, turn off the TV and read a book or play a game. Not a crappy book, or a crappy game, good ones.

                          

Okay it was on easy but it's a hard game. Now I just need to beat it on normal, with the Kestrel.

                          

Reality is not always or often simple, most often the reality of things are so complex that finding a root cause for someones actions is impossible, there are just too many variables and factors at play. Also in reality sometimes there is nothing and no one to blame, sometimes, things just happen. There is no rime or reason, they just happen. Yes the killers are to blame but beyond that - what led them to do what they did - there may be no one or nothing to blame.

You can take a billion people and stick them in the exact same conditions as the Aurora or New Port killers and they may not have done what the killers did, you could make a billion exact clones of the Aurora or New Port killers and place them in a billion different circumstances and they may not do what the killers did. It could very well have been those people in those exact conditions that led to the shootings. There is no way of knowing and blaming media, video games, how the mentally ill are dealt with, their families, etc does not help, it only hurts.

                          

Well it's the 22nd, the world didn't end. There was no catastrophe, there was no shift in global consciousness but then that one has no meaning and thus is unfalsifiable.
To all those who believed something would happen: *points* Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ah ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha! *in hails* That felt good.

As of time of posting a huge doomsayers website is still up. Their forums have been taken down but their facebook page is still up so go trollin'. I doubt these will stay up much longer, I'd bet they'll be down before Christmas.

In the past month I've been making fun of the 2012 doomsayers but there are serious and real world consequence to the doomsayings of doomsayers. Fortunetly it seems no one was hurt or died this time. NASA did get a bunch of calls from people fearing something would happen on the 21st, many from kids, many of which considered suicide. There was at least one man who was willing to take a literal leap of faith, one that would have killed him, fortunately he didn't. There was a risk of a mass suicide in Córdoba Argentina. An anonimus facebook user posted:

To all believers, beings and warriors of the light, I invite you to a spiritual suicide en masse in Uritorco, Córdoba, Argentina. We will all abandon our unclean flesh and transport our spirit through the inter-dimensional portal at 21 hours, 12 minutes on 21/12/2012 and from this will be created an army of light that will save humanity… In this change of era.

The Córdoba state government closed Uritorco Hill where it was planned to take place. Now the guy who posted it could have been a troll but even if he was that doesn't mean some people wouldn't have bought into it.
© 2012 all rights reserved

                          

With the recent shooting at a school in Newtown Connecticut and the shooting in Aurora Colorado violent video games are in the news again. The old men in the old media are blaming violent video games as they always do when a shooting hits the national news.
Violent video games have been the target of old media and conservatives for years. They will spout dubious studies and claim there is a link. They will blame any act of violence on violent video games even if the perpetrator never played a video game in his life.

In 1954 Fredric Wertham published the book Seduction of the Innocent^[1] in which he blamed comic books for juvenile crime. From his book arose the comics code which castrated the comic book industry for decades^[2]. Decades before the film industry suffered similarly. In 1930 the Hollywood studios instituted the motion picture production code which like the comics code castrated the film industry. The Hollywood studios instituted it because of a growing moral panic about immorality in films and the film industry feared the government would step in and regulate the morals of the film industry them selves^[3].
Both the comics code and motion picture production code restricted or out rite banned violence, sex, gore, the super natural, criticism of authority, how criminals where depicted, drug use (even if it was an anti-drug message), depictions of homosexuality, depictions of relationships between people of different races, etc.

Violent video games do not cause violence. I say that with certainly. It does not. I can back this up, with statistics.
Between 1960 and 2012 violent crime was at it's lowest in 1962 with 4.6 murders per 100,000 people, 9.4 rapes per 100,000 people and 88.6 aggravated assaults per 100,000 people. From there violent crime rose to 10.2, 36.8, 298.5 in 1980. Violent crime rate fluctuated until 1991 with 9.8, 42.3 and 433.4. It has sense been dropping until in 2010 where it was at 4.8, 27.5 and 252.3. Sense 1991 violent crime has been going down.^[4]

The SNES (Super Nintendo) came out in America in 1993, the Sega Genesis came out in 1989. Wolfenstein 3D came out in 1992, Doom came out in 1993. The first generation of 3D game consoles came out in 94, the second generation of 3D game consoles came out in 2000, the third and currant generation came out in 2005. Between those years and sense 2005 graphics technology on the PC side has increased and access to video games because of digital distribution has grown. Games have been getting more realistic and more violent sense 94. If violent video games cause violence in people you'd expect violent crime to rise not drop.

Of course correlation does not imply causation but if violent video games caused violence in people, violent crime rates should at least have stayed the same. The lowering of violent crime, increasing realism and access to games could just mean that violent video games have no impact on violent crime. Heres where my ability to back up my claims with statistics end but I do have logic.

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seduction_of_the_Innocent
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comics_Code_Authority
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motion_Picture_Production_Code
4. http://www.ucrdatatool.gov/Search/Crime/State/RunCrimeStatebyState.cfm

                          

I like horror games, I like games that are scary, I like games that are creepy, I like games that make you not want to go forward but you must go forward. My enjoyment of horror games started with Silent Hill, I had taken back another game that started out good but when to shit and traded it in for Silent Hill and my love of horror games started from there.
The problem for people like me is: there are not that many horror games and many that call them selfs "horror" are not horror. For example: The Fear series is not horror, Dead Space is not horror, you can not be scared when you have enough firepower to liquefy the monster attacking you.

A major mistake made by game designers (and movie makers) is the use of brightly lit wide open spaces. There's a reason why the best horror games, books and movies use tight claustrophobic spaces or a lot of darkness, theres a reason why a hunted house is scarier than a hunted meadow. In a brightly lit hallway you can see all they way down it, in a dark hallway you can't see that far, in a dark or foggy open aria you have limited visibility. With limited visibility you don't know whats coming up, you could be headed strait for a monster and not know it. In tight compact spaces you have one escape route unless there's a monster behind you in which you have none. These add to the sense of horror and adds tension to the atmosphere, the lack of these takes those away.

I've talked about the mistakes made in so called "horror" games but what works?
The use of fog, darkness and claustrophobic environments. The sparing and strategic use of monsters, gore and jump scares but at the same time these are not necessary for good horror (a good horror game could be made with no gore, no jump scares and only one monster). Don't make monsters too easy to kill, they don't have to be hard to kill just not too easy. Good horror games are not action games, the best horror games are mysteries and exploration games.
Beyond those. Build an atmosphere, the best horror games have built creepy atmospheres. Mystery: not knowing whats going on allows the players mind to fill in the blanks and their minds fill in the blanks with what scares them the most. Proper pacing: don't jump right into the horror, start slowly, build up the tension then you bring in the horror. Use peoples fears: there are a lot of fears people have you can exploit, the fear of loosing loved ones, loosing control, being hunted, the unknown, etc.

Hopefully one day horror games will be a lot more prevalent, maybe when video game mature out of the faux maturity of sex and violence and the brown gray crap FPS's.
© 2012 all rights reserved