For School: McSweeney's and the world

McSweeney's is ... I don't really know how to describe it.  A catalogue?  Publishing house?  Writer's Coalition?  Now doubt there is a more legitimate title, but, as of now, such a name has escaped me.

Now, how does this correspond to the assignment?  Well, frankly, I forgot what exactly the assignment WAS, what with this unconscious dependency on the expectation that the internet will solve all my problems (of remembering homework), and so this may not correspond to the rubric (which doesn't exist).  HOWEVER, from what I gather, I was supposed to find an artist of some sort who creates work circa world issues, etc.; while McSweeney's is rather far from a singular artist, it does indeed provide commentaries, stories, reports, and criticisms on nearly everything you can think of, from the modern sociopolitical dilemmas faced and lives lived by "Latin-American" commonfolk ( https://store.mcsweeneys.net/products/mcsweeneys-issue-46-47 ) to the trials of a very vehement seasonal decorator ( http://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/its-decorative-gourd-season-motherfuckers ).  Whilst not always strictly nonfiction, McSweeney's publishings are always pertinent in one fashion or another, whether to modern events or historical happenings/cultures.  They aren't always strictly humorous, either.  Not to mention the ART (which is just awesome):

Honestly, I don't really know/keep up on many politically focused artists, so ... yeah, here you go.  If you wanna read about them/just see their stuff:

http://www.mcsweeneys.net/

Art things

Grabbed these out of my sketchbook as now that this thing is serving as a semi-portfolio (I know, not a good idea), I should probably put some work up, though time runs short and so this is a bit rushed, plus I don't have a scanner, so I apologize for the quality.

(too much Hendrix?  NEVER)

Proof

Proof that I do, in fact, do semi-serious work/game art.  A few recent rigs/models, hi-poly and low.  Sometimes with normal textures, sometimes diffuse, sometimes specular, often all.

"Hella Jank" game vid

Yep.  Framerate's crap because recording software's crap, and computer's crap.  Waddayaknow.

"I Gave Idiots Swords"-- new videos

yep.

Features Overview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoXuZSDpACI&list=UU12PimWlvg0JX8D0CHFE3Vw

Map Generator:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_zVifnOdFOY&list=UU12PimWlvg0JX8D0CHFE3Vw

Sorry for not embedding it; Blogger's decided that the Features video doesn't actually exist.

Film Review #27: Black Shades (game)

We all know Wolfire Games, yes?  Indie game dev company, created such brilliant digital experiences such as Receiver and Overgrowth?  Well.  They have made quite a few games (relatively), one of which being this beautiful old-ish game, Black Shades.

In Black Shades, you play as a body guard (or something with roughly the same job description) with some slick black shades, attempting to protect a dapper fellow in full white garments.  Basically, people run around with pistols, shotguns, snipers, knives, and more and try to kill this particular fellow.  Your job is to STOP that from happening!  Gameplay takes place in a randomly (?), infinitely generated city, in various kinds of weather, among civilians, assassins, and (sometimes) zombies.  The player is, in each level, given one particular weapon-- a type of pistol, a machine gun, a grenade, etc.... One of those, among a number of others.  You can melee, shoot/stab/lob grenades, and tackle.  OH!  And slow down time.  There's also a curious super-sight-type element, though frankly I simply don't use it much.  Maybe I'm not competent (I'm not), but it's worth mentioning, given this is a review.

Now, REVIEWING:  the fact that, for computers, the game is free makes it certainly worth getting.  It's a small file, and provides plenty of fun.  A classy, quick little singleplayer FPS, with a unique feel and set of skills for the player's character.  They ARE somewhat broken in one fashion of another, varying with platform-- for example, in the Windows version, tackling throws off the character's rotation immensely, making that form of attack essentially void.  As I said, the vision thing doesn't operate very conveniently, though frankly I haven't played with it much and thus am not quite suited to talk about it.  It DOES look nice.  The game's slow-motion is awesome, but that is to be expected with Wolfire; they seem to have perfected it, along with most everything else.  Again, it's an old game.  Another thing: if your Mac lacks PowerPC support (newer OSs no longer feature this), then this game's mac version simply won't work for you.  That said, just use Wine or something; it's not exactly a performance-intensive game, so using DirectX emulators, etc. won't ruin the experience.
    About that:  the game's graphics are basic.  Flat diffuse shading, no shadows.  However, these aren't, of course, necessary to make a good game; the use of mist/atmospherics plus rain/snow effects mean atmosphere is most DEFINITELY achieved.  Ragdolls are also a thing.  A fun thing.

*ALSO!  Doesn't seem to be on Linux.

Site:  http://www.wolfire.com/black-shades

I Gave Idiots Swords: everything else new.

I've added quite a bit, relative to my (lacking) standards!  So.
Change/added features list:
-soldiers now have teams:  red, green, and blue.  They don't attack allies.  Isn't that nice.

-soldiers now have helmet plumes: correspond to team color.  Color is maintained in ragdolls.

-soldiers are now born from soda machines: ...  Spawners, based on assigned properties, can spawn soldiers of a certain type (or random type: swordsman, pikeman, archer), and can determine the team of said soldiers either randomly or by assigned property (a spawner with a property "SPAWN:team" that reads "red" will only spawn red soldiers.  If it's empty, it'll spawn soldiers of random teams.  Same system goes for soldier type.)

-there is an onion portal:  it's a box into the Onionworld, from which denizens of that horrid land spew forth.  ...
No, but seriously, I made onions, and when you press O they spew out of a wooden crate.  When I've gotten around to it, one in about 20 will metamorphose into a yeti when sufficiently pulverized.

-the ground is trampoline lava:  when someone falls off the towers and bridges into the bland abyss below, they are launched back up towards the center platform at...  High speeds.  It makes for a more literal experience of, "IT'S RAAAIINNIN' MEN".  That said, it's terrifying.

-the player has health, and can be damaged: about 10,000.00 of it, versus the 40 of yetis and 2 of normal soldiers.  Nothing happens when you die (yet), but taking damage causes a damage-based camera offset that makes you feel like your character has a burning urge to look at the spear in his stomach.  Mostly because he "does".  Or she.  Your pick; at present the player is an ethereal sword-and-shield-bearing nothing.

-the player has a shield: that's another thing; the player now has a usable shield!

 -shields actually do something: impact via shield will prevent damage (usually) and cause knockback to both attacker and attackee.

-spears are still broken: people impaled by spears still fly into space.  I think I'll leave that.

-yetis have ragdolls: yes, even the yeti can be killed.  And dismembered and thrown into pieces.

-impale physics working: yep.

-finally... SOUNDS!: impacts on metallic and bladed impacts, arrow sounds, blood sounds.  Also, yeti shrieks.
 

Plenty of other background stuff has seen work as well.  Now, I'd like to note:
 RAGDOLLS IN BLENDER ARE NOT INTEGRATED.  The Blender game engine doesn't have a direct ragdoll support system; thus, ragdolls are created via scripts that run through each limb/part of a character and, based on their traits, create ragdoll limbs linked by unique physics constraints/pivots, inheriting the velocity of the original character.  These limbs can be removed by some blades.  Just for the record, as an explanation for my eccentric obsession with pulling this stuff off.  Now,
SCREENSHOTS!

-- WAIT --

This game is horrendously graphic.  This hideous, morbid excuse for a "game" will strike terror into the hearts of those who view it.

Oh, and it's pretty gory.

--

The onion portal at work.

 

 Vending machines, one for red team, one for green, one random.  (Blue's been excluded)

The unfortunate fate of those who fall.

That's right, not even yetis are spared.  And yeah, they fly pretty high.

A little more on the ... egh... "yeti".  It needs some work.

Also, he grabs people and clubs others with em.  For the record.

Some inter-team combat.  Actually, some friendly fire, a flying arm, and someone trying to hack my arms off, but hey, one can dream.

Some proof that the sword does NOT, in fact, just sit on the side of  the screen.

Sword throwing is still functional.

A NOTE:  This game is not meant to be pretty.  It's meant to run fast and be consistently fun, if not functional.  And silly.  Just keep that in mind.

3D, non-cubic map generator

I'm going to split this post up into multiple, because ... yeah.  There you go.

On the medieval combat game I've been posting about (currently aptly named "I Gave Idiots Swords", or IGIS for brevity), map generation has been furiously attacked and eviscerated quite effectively.  I mean, not really, but ...  *sigh*  Observe.

Using some 3D trig and random floats, the map generates a random (between 1 and however many ya might want; for now the threshold is at about 7) number of towers around a central tower, with random distances kept within reasonable ranges and random height displacement, within reasonable ranges.  These are then linked with bridges.  The entire process runs in two scripts, about 20 and 110 lines long, and can be easily adjusted to adapt tower radius, tower height, bridge length, platform offsets, distance between towers, etc.  The bridges, bridge terminals, and towers themselves are all standard meshes-- hence, the use of the second 20-line script, which adjusts bridge length to prevent protrusion through platform bases, etc.  More is to be added, like tunnels, scene props, etc.  Obviously it's not much of a castle, but it's fun, and frankly that's what it needs to be.

Originally the script was recursive, based on an integer property "iteration", and would branch the towers out into a deranged mess.  For now, that feature's been disabled, until I become competent enough to actually do anything about its ensuing chaos.

Pathfinding is in the works, as since the map is random Blender's standard navmesh system is no longer applicable.  This is gonna take a while.  Anyway, the navmesh approach to be attempted (in vain) will probably be THIS:
http://www.policyalmanac.org/games/aStarTutorial.htm
The A* approach!  This shouldn't be too difficult, but knowing Blender's aptitude for making my life miserable, I repeat:  this is gonna take a while.

Film Review #26: Between Two Ferns (comedy ... thing)

This is... very nice.  VERY nice.  Basically, a mockery of low-budget talk shows run by Zach Galifianakis.  He takes people, ranging from Obama to Bieber, and "interviews" them-- basically, it runs as a couple-minute slur of ridiculously cold, back-handed insults thrown back and forth, Zach instigating.  I haven't seen a whole lot, but what I have seen, I like.  Obama was bloody hilarious, whatever you think of his policies.  Bieber was a little slow to pick up on what was going on, and a bit slower to come up with any decent responses, and maybe that's my opinion talking, but, hey, TV doesn't lie, right?

...

*sigh*

Well.  Anyway.  Watch it.  It's on Youtube.  Between Two Ferns, with Zach Galifianakis.  If you like dry humor, short videos, low-budget-esquery, jibes sharp enough to shave with, and tropical plants, go on, enjoy.

Obama:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnW3xkHxIEQ

I'd like to go on a "profound" rant about some aspect of media, but frankly, I'm tired.  I'll do that another time.

Update on what I'm "doing"

I apologize profusely for the following English.  I was not in the best... state of mind in Digital Media class when I wrote this.

I kinda want to make a short sci-fi live action film, live action with CGI composited, based loosely in the Hella Jank (game) universe I was workin' on earlier...  Like there was a plague in the solar system and everyone's tryin' to get to earth because they think it's a sanctuary (it ain't gotten infected yet) but they're all infected so earthlings can't let them in because if they get in everyone'll get infected and die because there's no cure, so the protagonist helps to destroy the orbital ring which everyone relies on for interplanetary docking because ships are no longer made for lithosphere-based takeoff/landing because it's inefficient, and meanwhile they're dealing with the moral conflicts associated with this, and there's some other stuff, but...  Well... I simply don't have the time.  Probably.  Got a ton of school/precollege/intern/job work to do already.  So.

Meanwhile, the game I've been actively working on -- the medieval combat game -- has seen some progress.  There are now swordsmen with shields, archers, and spear people.  Impaling has improved, so people can carry corpses around on weapons, but thrown spear collision is still broken so people fly into space when they get impaled on thrown spears.  Dismemberment's also still working fine.  Yeah.  Working on adding procedural obstacle navigation for the dynamically/randomly generated castle, along with improved AI stuff (attacking closest foe; sounds easy, but believe me, it ain't).  Optimizing blood spray/splatter.  Sound effects with multiple versions have been added for impacts (swords, shields, flesh, arrows) and for death shouts (honestly, I used the cheatcode input sounds from Receiver.  They're... like... Yeti sounds? ...)  And a bloody sword.  Not the sound effects, just the fact that it gets bloody.  Also added character health, impact recoil (from getting shanked, jumping off stuff, etc.), and some nice cam movement dampening/elaboration so handling feels much more dynamic.

SCREENSHOTS:  be warned, bloody as hell.  This is not a pretty game.  In fact, it is made in the name of making stupid, over-the-top games.  Because they're fun.

 

A victorious pikeman.

 

Something to give you the gist of just what's going on...

 Person impaled on a pike-spear-thing.  Fun.

 

Bloody sword.  Blood dissipates.

Oh, and I added a yeti.

 

More on that later.

Film Review #25: Battlefield 4 cont (not really)

So, Battlefield 4 is awesome.  Runs faster than Arma 3, looks amazing, tons of customization, immersive gameplay, just intense and terrific all around.  Even an excellent stealth mechanic in the Campaign that actually lets you approach a mission as you choose, not that crap where they're like "click 1 to go loud, 2 to go stealth".  No.  Better than that.  That said, campaign is quite short, but that's understandable, as BF4 is a circa-multiplayer game and the campaign is thus a brief precursor to multiplayer, familiarizing people with the game and whatnot.  Now, MULTIPLAYER.  Multiplayer is awesome.  Insane, and awesome.  We know this.  But that's not what I'm going to talk about RIGHT NOW.

You see, I've only played maybe two matches of online BF4.  You know why?  No, it isn't because I don't have time, or it's broken (it is, but not nearly fatally, anymore).  It's because of Comcast.  I've only been able to play BF4 at a friend's house, once, because MY internet is being throttled by Comcast.  If you try to boot up internet-reliant, intensive programs, the internet cuts short and doesn't let you run them.  Now, my internet has plenty of room for usage-- the thing is, I downloaded BF4 and two other games over the course of a week.  Comcast saw this and was like, oh, HELL NO YOU DON'T.  Even though my internet covers it.  Because they're GREEDY.  LITTLE.  SHITS.  This is all entirely illegal, mind you.  The comcast thing (that's right, they don't get a capital C anymore because they don't deserve it).  This brings us back to some of the recent legislative bills giving corporations full regulation of internet functionality.  It's not OK, they don't have the right, and you're squandering the small businesses the internet has become the hub for: startups, dev blogs, small-time websites...  They all get crushed.  Fight it, people.  Jesus christ.

I know, this is coming a bit late, it only REALLY pissed me off (believe me, I was before, but now my right to shoot digital people is under IMMINENT THREAT) just in the last week.

Film Review #24: Battlefield 4 (very, VERY first impressions)

Still getting the hang of this game, campaign is absolutely beautiful, multiplayer is... broken as hell.  Can't get online, my friend even personally asked some devs to help my case and no luck as of yet.  Oh well, that pisses me off.  So.  Experience so far... is... the above.

Game handles well; lots of weapons, beautiful (and I goddamn MEAN it), BEAUTIFUL graphics.  Campaign is fun, I liked their use of cinematics (I know, surprising)...  However, their music choice was a bit awkward, and some stuff that was probably intended to be very moving... wasn't.  Poor transitions in cinematics killed a lot of it.

Now, there's one thing I really, REALLY wanna bring up.  In the first mission, you go sprinting through wartorn urban China, rounding up civilians to save, or something.  One of them says something like, "Oh, Americans.  Thank god you're here; we could really use your help."  Just...  Just reflect on that statement for a moment.  Consider it.  Obviously (at least, it seems to me), this is satirically employed.  It's just...  So great.  Just the IDEA of someone actually saying that nowadays.  When pigs fly, my friend.  When pigs fly.

I'll write more on the game as I play it some more.