WilloughbyJackson
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Posts posted by WilloughbyJackson
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Looking great! (And thanks for answering my question earlier.)
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I got a concept in my head which is a cross between missile command and tower defense.
Aliens are attempting to take over the earth, and you have to defeat them while putting on a show with lots of fireworks...(Because people can't learn about aliens existence..y'know...THERE WOULD BE A PANIC!)
However, my progress tonight has been pretty bad because:
- I'm still learning Unity, and get stuck a lot
- I decided to make it a 3D game, which I never ever had to dealt with before now.
And then, when attempting to get a coroutine working, I accidentally created an infinite loop, and the Unity Editor was hardcore frozen. After reopening the Unity Editor, I realized that I forgot to save the scene, so all my Script were up to date, but I lost all my prefabs, empty game code objects, etc...
Calling it a night... >_<
The alien ship over the city...should have been at least moving by now.. T_T
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Awesome! Admittedly, I'm curious how you are doing layer sorting in Unity 2D?
(I'll admit, it's probably pretty easy but I haven't looked into it yet...)
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Kids and house chores left me too tired to jam this weekend, but I managed to sketch a few more characters for the game:
Looking nice. (And it's awesome to know someone else is dealing with kids and chores too
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While I continue to brainstorm some ideas...I found one of my old 48-hour contest Flash games. (Which was taken from my website and posted EVERYWHERE...thanks Flash Portal Business model...
)The theme was "Package"...
http://kilogames.com/games/1384/mary-jean-human-package-rescuer-girl.html
Enjoy..mayhaps...
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Jake does a 1440 off the stump followed by a reverse 1080 into a face slider. NICE!
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Nice!
Somehow, I am reminded of that "Don't Shoot the Puppy" game....except this one looks like it will be fun.
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Man! I didn't even think about glasses. >_<
Thanks for the suggestions ~!
The first thing that came to mind to me is that 'spectacle' can refer to both a spectacular event and glasses. So...something based around They Live style spectacles, that make things you look at a spectacle? That might be difficult. I donno.
(also you don't have to use the first random one you get, if you don't want!)
Naw...I think I'll keep this one. It will make it more challenging...
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(Insert Favorite Soccer Chant Here)
Looks like a good start, and sounds like a sports game I could get into.
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Hey everybody ~!
Long time reader, first time poster...(not really).
To do a brief introduction, I have been a Flash programmer for about 9 years now, (worked on games (mostly advertgames) for about 7 years). Recently, I have started to learn Unity 3D and would love to actually produce something fun but didn't have much of a focus. So, I've decided to take part in this here Wizard Jam to give me a focus and a deadline.
I used the random title picker...and got The Spectacle was Incredible.
I'll be the first to admit: I have NO IDEA what kind of game goes with that title.
Anyhow, I'll be brainstorming tonight and hopefully will have something by tomorrow...
Although I would absolutely love to team up with someone, my current schedule is SUPER erratic, and I have no idea of my availability...
(Yep..perfect time for a game jam.
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I am so happy they mentioned this on the podcast~!
After working in Flash more than 7 years (mostly advergames), I have recently started to learn Unity. This game jam should give me the necessary kick in the pants to complete something no matter what (similar to the old Flash Kit Games 48 hour contests..oh memories).
And using the random episode picker...my theme is...
The Spectacle was Incredible
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Okay..I can work with this...
Edit: I know it is kind of passe since Adobe is pretty much killing it themselves but if anyone is going to be using Flash, I can help with questions...
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Neither Anita or I are saying that using tropes means that you're necessarily writing a bad story. (Heck, one of my favorite leisure activities other than games is reading YA. Clearly I don't think that everything using them is bad!
) People are going to have different interpretations of things because they are different people and have had different lives and experiences. This is ok! This does mean that some people may be especially sensitive about certain tropes and feel certain characters fall into them while others may find that completely baffling. Like you say, in the example you give, if I only saw the first episode, I could easily say that it falls into the trope of "Something Bad happens to Girl in order to prod Boy into action," and I might sigh and stop watching because I find that trope really frustrating and it really is all over the dang place. "Ah!" you then interject, "She rescues herself two episodes later though!" But neither of us is actually wrong -- the show falls into the trope mentioned but then neatly avoids the "Boy rescues the damsel in distress" trope. If the creators had chosen to avoid that initial scenario, perhaps Theoretical Seasleepy would have kept watching. It doesn't mean the show is bad, it just means it is yet another drop in the ocean of things that use that trope.
Fully agree. Though it does kind of show how easy it is (without context), things can lose all meaning.
Admittedly, the more I think about it, the more I think: "Man, AAA video games are full of useless violence in general..."
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I can't take someone seriously if they can't be bothered to spell a person's name correctly. If you're going to write about Zoe Quinn, have the decency to get her name right.
And I have no idea why her having a Youtube video where some guy talks about her sex and personal life pulled is a huge controversy or abuse of the system. If something like that existed about me on the Internet and I'd do everything in my power to have it removed.
Strictly speaking, the DMCA law (as I understand), you are suppose to notify the party in question first they are infringing on your copyright. Also, although personal, the video my "friend" sent me had no clips of anything related to Depression Quest or anything copyrighted by Zoe. So basically, you can be sued for false DMCA, or it can overturned. (This almost happened to a creationist who was DMCAing a scientist for posting a rebuttal to his arguments about the evolution...(which the creationist asked for, btw))
This of course, doesn't matter if you're a media conglomerate, then you have that ContentID stuff which works automatically... (sigh)
As far as I know, there is a process for abusive videos at Youtube, but it's a lot slower.
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Even with my professional training, I am always very careful to use "authentic" rather than "accurate" in most situations. The former says that something feels right based on current knowledge, the latter that something actually was that way, which is a crock of shit. There are so many ways for games (and movies and TV) to be authentic to a time and place without violence against women, but the fact that that violence is epidemic in our culture right now means that it gets used all the time by developers without much conscious thought about whether it should be used.
Agree! -
Popped into the conversation for a few points: one, to echo Doug, both on his ban policy and to add that fiery rhetoric -- and I'm including those who more or less agree with the things on the cast, needs to be kept in check because it's a spring board to really worthless conversation.
Secondly, my opinion of Red Dead did not change -- Anita's video was a reminder that, in addition to all of Anita's excellent points in her video, the homogenous and pervasive and shear tonnage of the *same* violence is really gross and boring. Anita's point is that the violence in these games IS either totally contextless or designer window dressing to get the player to do a thing. Think about that for a second and it's pretty gross.
Three, you can't compare violence against women in games to violence against women in other media because context matters and 99% of the execution of this trope in games is conceived of and implemented thoughtlessly, artlessly and meaninglessly. Instances of worthless and manipulative violence against women in film *is* attacked the same way except it can be handled on a case by case basis because it is, unlike games, not perpetrated in the majority of its content.
Hey Sean! Thanks for the response. Much love to ya brother.
- Two (since your second point was about my post): Ah..Gotcha. I'll be honest, it totally sounded like your opinion on Red Dead as a whole changed by seeing the instance in a different light.
- Three: I'd argue you can't compare violence in video games to violence in other media in general. I think a LOT of systems in games are executed thoughtless, artlessly. I'd even say the majority of the violence in games IS either totally contextless or designer window dressing to get the player to do a thing. I think if you put together a super cut of violence to everyone in a typical AAA game nowadays, and sent it to CNN, they would have a field day.
Once again, my point was less the: "LOL..sexism doesn't exist" and more that without context, meaning can be completely lost. Because it is the context which can change something violent and boring into something different, and you kind of made me realize that.
Thanks for the response again...
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The context is irrelevant because the point is that the trope is ubiquitous and limiting, not that any particular example embodying a trope is the worst thing. Women are sexy/victims. Black people are villains/comic relief. It tells the world that these are the types of boxes these types of people need to fit into, which has real-world repercussions, but probably most critically if you want art to be interesting, it's fucking boring. Seeing Stock Lady Character A and Stock Black Character B and just rearranged in different positions in hundreds of pieces of media is the most dull thing. There are certainly places where they can be executed well, or used to subvert expectations, or places where you could make the argument that the character is not in fact a Stock Character despite exhibiting some of the same characteristics, but the issue is the ubiquity.
Oh I agree with you that tropes can be limiting, ubiquitous, and it can be very dull.
However, I think without context, it is super equal easy to take characters and shove them into tropes because they fit some of the qualities of said trope. Does every women who gets kidnapped is a Stock lady Character A trope? Does every character who is black and a villain Stock black Character B?
In an old cartoon, Dragon Warrior (a.k.a Dragon Quest in Japan), the main hero's girlfriend gets (stop me if you have heard this one before) kidnapped. Now I could cut out the kidnapping out of the story at this point in time and it becomes Stock lady Character 5342344234234234234234242 trope.
However, if you continue to watch the show, she escapes on her own, using her cleverness and then it becomes a story about two character searching for each other.
Could the author do something clever and different with the characters and avoid the whole kidnapping thing? Sure! Does this mean because they used the kidnapping subplot, it automatically makes the story bad? In my opinion, it doesn't.
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Anyway, I'm going to bed, but good talk.
Ditto. Good night.
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I believe in non-dude speak they refer to that as "subverting a trope".
>_< I..I..was trying to be funny...
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Okay: blackface is a vaudeville trope. No-one does blackface any more because what is good about vaudeville doesn't require you to perpetuate vicious stereotypes about black people. Rockstar didn't need to tie a woman to a railroad track or make an anti-semitic shopkeeper, but they chose to perpetuate those tropes in 2012.
The context isn't just in-game, but in the environment the work was made and everything it draws from. If you're going to use the same old tropes to say 'hey, the West was nasty', you're also regurgitating the racism and sexism of earlier Westerns. There are people who can get away with it - Django Unchained was explicitly trying to make an old Western without the latent racism - but Rockstar aren't Tarantino no matter how much they wish they were.
Yes, but remember that objectification of women is more widespread and more limiting. Men don't get objectified as often, and when they are they tend to be more varied.
I could go into a rant about black face, Amos and Andy and things like that (I'm black) but right now, I'll just concentrate on my point.
Although the blackface character is gone (as in white people playing stereotypes of blacks), the tropes created by it are still quite alive and well (now played by blacks). BUT depending upon the context, I will either have a problem with it, or not. I can't say just because the black character in the movie is acting silly, speaking slang-filled English, he's doing the "blackface" character. What if he does something to break the trope elsewhere in the movie? What if it turns out, he's a complex character who just likes to have fun sometimes?
Another Example: Both you (at least I am assuming by your statement about the movie above) and I liked Django Unchained. I know quite a few people who consider that movie to be racist, offensive. Some of them have NEVER seen the movie, just clips and are just going off what Spike Lee said...who also has never saw the movie.
In addition, there are a whole lot of people using the "N" word in the movie. I hate the word and don't think anyone should use it (white or black). Some people think Tarantino IS "regurgitating the racism" of the West and the South by using it and it should be stopped. But should we pretend it didn't and doesn't exist?
What I'm trying to say is, I do realize there is a problem in games with women objectification, but that it is quite easy to take something out of context and say: "Hey, this objectifies women in games!"
As for the racist storekeeper in RDR, I leave this article by Brainy Gamer:
http://www.brainygamer.com/the_brainy_gamer/2010/05/im-your-huckleberry.html
(edit: for grammar and to remove something that didn't really relate to the main point...)
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You'd be hard-pressed though to find an instance of that trope where the women was ever actually hit by the train. It's generally a woman being rescued from being hit by a train. The achievement is pretty much the opposite of the trope.
Well, that probably was the point, in my opinion. You are Snidely Whiplash and (please read the follow in dude speak) it is taking a trope and flipping it upside down, bro (because you can be super evil in the game if you want).
Does that justify it, probably not. I never got that achievement, and judging by the gore in the game, it was probably pretty horrible. I was more making the point that I can see how someone could think of it.
I can see someone in a studio meeting go:
"Hey, let's have a rescue the girl on a train track achievement!"
"Oh..better..let's let the villain win!"
"OH COOL!"
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I think you missed the point of the video (and that video really back-ended its argument, so if you skipped out early it probably came off as fairly nitpicky): the context is, as you describe, putting a rubber stamp on what is clearly shitty behaviour. What we don't notice that there's lots of games that lazily rubber-stamp objectification of women, and violence towards objects, as part of their fantasy, because we also have a context that rubber-stamps shitty behaviour towards women. That's why stripping it of its context is important: without the rationalisations, we see it for what it is, and we have to ask questions; for instance why exactly did no-one point out the run-down-a-woman-with-a-train achievement as potentially shitty? How were we all okay with that? And because we have that context out here in the real world, bad writers unthinkingly put it into their games. So it's bad writing, but it's bad writing that reveals something about the unconscious assumptions of the writers.
I did watch the whole video, and still think context is important. My post was specifically responding to Sean's example on the podcast and his reaction, because I've been there before.
As for the run-down-a-woman-with-a-train achievement, as horrible as that is, it is another Western trope. Yep, if you take out the context it IS a pretty horrible thing to tie ANYONE to a railroad track. It's pretty horrible to go kill a bunch of people because "they seem like bad guys to me". Out of context it is a horrible thing to have a racist shop keeper constantly spewing anti-semiotic crap. Out of context, shooting someone over a game of cards is horrible... Out of context, it is a horrible thing to hang someone from a tree because you think they wronged you somehow..etc..etc...
I can probably go through a TON of media I like and pull stuff out and say "LOOK, HOW HORRIBLE THIS IS!" because people do horrible things in both books, movies and games. That is why context is important, because "rationalisations" allows you to decide if the content is good or bad on a whole. (For example: I liked RDR, but hated Watch Dogs...)
Once again, not saying a problem doesn't exist..just like you aren't saying "games industry are women-hating misogynists". However, I think your statement about objectification of everything in video games is probably closer to the truth.
My question for you is this:
"Because we have that context out here in the real world, bad writers unthinkingly put it into their games"
Do you think someone should be allowed to create a REALLY horrible, misogynistic jerk in something..ever?
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After listening to Sean's statements about the latest Anita Sarkeesian video, I'd like to respond to why I think his opinion changed about Red Dead Redemption.
One reason why you felt differently about the women and bar random event in Red Dead Redemption when you experienced it in the game versus Anita's video is an important thing which Anita's videos never provide: context.
In RDR, you'd be riding through the world and might run into a store robber, a dude being hung in a tree, a wounded lawman who was shot by outlaws, cannibals and other horrible stuff. This paints a picture that the world is a horrible place and bad things can happen at anytime. In the context of the game, you thought the event was a horrible thing and shot the guy who did the horrible deed: A.K.A. "Old West Justice" trope. Be it good or bad, RDR also plays off a lot of the established tropes in the western genre: The west is a horrible, lawless place, and a strong person with a gun is the only law.
However, if you take all scenes of violence against women, put them back to back in a video without any context, the result is perdictably gross, horrible, and most importantly, boring, because you have no investment in that world or the story anymore.
If you remove context from anything, you can change the meaning of that thing completely.
For example:
- I could make a super cut of Quentin Tarantino films with all the white characters using the "n-word" and say "Look, he's the biggest racist on the planet." (I have no problem with Tarantino at all...)
- I've seen someone show only the walking around in Gone Home without picking up any of the amazing and detailed world building items or going into the story at all and say: "See, it's a walking simulator...NOT GAME!" (I love Gone Home!)
- I've seen people take ever instance of a demon or monster appearing in a ton of kid cartoons and say: "Look! Kids cartoons lead you to Satan, by making Satan cool!" (I grew up watching a lot of these cartoons and still have not sacrficed anything...)
Am I saying that there isn't a problem with the way females in games are portrayed? Nope.
Does this make all her points invalid? Nope.
What I am saying is keep in mind that you are seeing everything out of context in her videos, with her as the narrator. Some of the examples may not be as bad as all that with the context provided by the overall game, the tone, and the story. I usually side with lazy writing, and trope crutches used for 1000s of years in books, plays, movies, and TV.
But either way, women death screams can be really gross!
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Thanks for the podcasts!Thirdeded...
And just after I got a friend of mine addicted to your cast too.
Oh well. Thanks for casting your pod out on our collective faces...
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Personally, I like both versions of the podcast and will miss them when they are gone. Idle Thumbs generally has the best mix of zany comedy, and very interesting video game related discussion. The discussion about achievements this episode was grand.
This thread is reminding me of a joke at the end of the latest episode Yugioh Abridged series..."WHY IS IT DIFFERENT?!?!"
Also this (all apologies to Steve):
[Released] The Spectacle was Incredible
in Wizard Jam 1 Archive
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Well, I'll post something Friday night... No matter what...
I wish I had more time to jam but.. life happens. (And Unity goes crazy and adding Canvas elements caused everything to break...finally figured out how to fix that...)
Plot: Aliens are coming but you can't let the general population know...How do you solve such a problem? WITH A GIANT PARTY!! Make sure the special fireworks cause the ufos to blow up in the sky and let the party keep on going~!