BGM Anthology V

It's that time of the year again, time for another BGM Anthology! This is the fifth installment of BGMA (we'll call it), so here come some doozies!

MINECRAFT: DRY HANDS
This is the second time I've used a song from Minecraft in BGMA, and it's because it love the music from it so much. It sets the mood perfectly. There's ambiance, dissonance, subtlety, beauty. Dry Hands is my favorite though. It's a very moving piece, only piano. It almost feels like a lament of sorts. It stands apart from all the other songs in Minecraft to me.




THE BLUE MARLIN: CAPE CANAVERAL
Who would have thought a fishing game would capture what I think to be the very core essence of an 8bit tune. Bouncy beat, catchy melody, great composition. Cape Canaveral is one of those songs that you just wanna listen to for hours. Or maybe not. Because anything can get annoying in hours. BUT BACK TO THE POINT, Cape Canaveral is one of my favorite retro BGMs of all time, and I'm glad it's in this list.




METAL GEAR SOLID 3, SNAKE EATER: MAIN THEME
The Metal Gear Solid series has always has a knack for releasing excellent games, so the other day I picked up a copy of Snake Eater 3D for my 3DS. I had never played Snake Eater, and I was immediately struck by the title sequence where this song plays. It's a great song, albeit the lyrics can be a bit weird. Snake Eater has such a great story, and this song captures it all up in one big musical BLAM! If you've never played Snake Eater, I'd advise it. Excellent game.

Zelda Symphony!

Alright, I cannot believe how lucky I am. Last year was the 25th Anniversary of The Legend of Zelda, my favorite game series of all time. There were all sorts of cool events and features, and game releases. But most important of all, would have to be the Zelda Symphony of the Goddess tour, which is happening this year! So, I finally scraped enough money together from working, birthdays, and leftovers, and I bought myself a ticket to the Atlanta showing! If you're going, I'll see you there. It happens in May, so I'll do a whole post about it.

Lego Minecraft

You guys know me, I'm a bit of a LEGO enthusiast. Now that we've got that out of the way, I'd also like to tell you I'm a bit of a MINECRAFT enthusiast. Alright, good. One more quick note before the body of this post: Do you remember my LEGO Zelda post I did? It talked about a site called LEGO CUUSOO, where you could submit ideas to LEGO and try to let them become real sets and themes! It's gaining popularity quickly, and it's the reason you're seeing the image above you. You see, a while back Mojang submitted the idea for a LEGO MINECRAFT theme, seeing as it's a cool idea. They did a blog post about it, and then suddenly... BOOM! 10,000 supporters in about 48 hours. LEGO acknowledged the fan base and said they'd get to work on it, and post an update in 2012. On New Year's Day, It was announced that LEGO approved the project and MINECRAFT would be released in LEGO form. But how would it look? We had to wait a while to find out, but what you see above you is LEGO CUUSOO Product #003, Minecraft Mini World. It's available for pre-order now, so pounce on this opportunity, so they don't run out. The set comes with the materials to build four changeable sets, and a mini buildable creeper and Steve.

How will this sell? Well, from what I can dig up, CUUSOO sells it's products exclusively on it's site, so don't be looking for in your local Toys-R-Us. However, it is possible that they could sell them in official LEGO Store, however, I'm not positive on that either. What I can tell you, is that this is one of the coolest things LEGO's done in a while, and I can't wait to get mine (craft).

Game Review! Dino Run SE

Okay, it's definitely been too long since my last post. To tell the truth I was thinking about just doing another BGM Anthology, but I decided to do a little review for a little game: Dino Run SE. Dino Run SE is an application for Mac, and we'll see if it's good enough for a buy. I usually only review games I like (which is probably the worst idea I've ever had), so I'm going to simply pluck this game out of the blue and review it.

STORYLINE:

Very simple. You are a dinosaur, going about your normal day. Suddenly, a gigantic meteor lands nearby and you have to run for your life to escape extinction. That's about it. This game is not story centered, so there's no reason for me to rant about the lack of story thereof. Sometimes, it's the simpler things that work out the best.

PRESENTATION: I usually do gameplay before this segment, but I decided this needs to come first. Dino Run SE is, as close as I can see, a modern take on Atari gen gaming. Now, let's procure ourselves a grain of salt quickly and delve into what I mean. All the sprites in this game could have been on the Atari. However, the music, animations, and overall quality tips you off that it's a modern game, and it flows easily together, which I love. Also, you can customize your dino with different colors and hats, so everyone is unique. Plus, it's super cool to have a Link dinosaur.

GAMEPLAY: Alright, here we go. Dino Run SE looks like an old-school game, and in a lot of ways plays like an old-school game. And in that I mean the gameplay was less than stellar to me. Your dino has to run from left to right, but he can be unresponsive, and the physics are just weird. I think eating eggs makes you faster, but most of the time I'm annoyed or confused. However, this isn't awful and something tells me they were shooting for that old-school approach anyway. There's a super cool online multiplayer mode, and it's fun to test your skill against other players.

In all, Dino Run SE is a fun game for casual gamers that will bring out some interesting gameplay and has great replay value. The gameplay can be a bit frustrating at times, but it's nothing too bad. It just takes some getting used to.

THREE OUT OF FIVE STARS

And that's not bad. You can pick yourself up a copy for (insert money value here because I forgot). Catch you later!

POKEDEMIC Update!

Hey everyone! Remember the whole project I talked about a month ago? Well, here's an update, half of the first part! You get the first two chapters of the upcoming "book" POKEDEMIC: A Study on the Impact of Video Games. Now, please keep two things in mind while reading. First, that the chapters you are going to read are introductory, and only serve as foundation for the epidemic I spoke of in the initial post; Second, these are direct ports of notes I took, so it may seem sort of spread out, but it's supposed to. So without hesitation, here's the first two chapters!

POKEDEMIC

A STUDY ON THE IMPACT OF VIDEO GAMES

By Charles Painter

PART 1: HUMBLE BEGINNINGS

In the social ladder of a school, some things are cool, and some things definitely are not. Video games, usually fall on the latter side of the equation, unless they involve what is “cool.” As for those that are not cool, what of the people who play them? Or are at least open about playing them? Where do they fall on the social ladder? 

CHAPTER 1: WHAT IS A GEEK?

What is a geek? Or a nerd for that matter? To be a geek for something simply means to have a passion for. You could be a geek for football, for instance. You keep up with the players, their averages, make educated guesses on who’s going to win the next game, or even what’s going to happen in the game, because you’ve devoted a lot of time to researching (in a way) and learning about football. However, nerd  and geek remain as hurtful slang.

So, why is “nerd” a derogatory term? Webster’s defines nerd as: “an unstylish, unattractive, or socially inept person; especially: one slavishly devoted to intellectual or academic pursuits.” So, to be a nerd means to lack social skills, or to dress in a way unaccepted by the status quo. It’s demeaning nature is expressed in it’s own essence.

But, what about geeks? Webster’s defines geeks as “an enthusiast or expert, especially in a technological field or activity.” It’s like what was stated above, a geek is someone who is passionate about a specific interest or hobby, and devotes themselves to it. The term geek can be used to describe anyone who is passionate about anything.

Geeks, in essence, are not the highest on the social ladder, but a more interesting question is “why?” This goes into the status quo, which silently states that anyone can be a geek and remain accepted, but if they are a geek for something unaccepted, then they too are unaccepted. This leads geeks who fit into the status quo to see themselves not as geeks, but simply as “popular” (a very vague term). However, unlike nerds, all geeks do not lack social skills (however, you can be both a nerd and geek), and therefore can fit into other groups and be accepted, while keeping their geek identity. This process is difficult, and the possibility of achieving it depends on your environment, but it can be done.

CHAPTER 2: VIDEO GAMES

Video games are the world’s most unique form of media, giving the consumer the power to play through the story and game. However, like we discussed in the first chapter, video games fall into the category of “nerdy,” meaning they aren’t accepted in the higher levels of the status quo (especially in teenagers, which is what this study is about). However, as we progress into this study, and what it is truly about, you will find that the opinions of a specific group can be changed from higher up in the group. Now, video games aren’t the most accepted form of media, but they aren’t the worst either. It depends on the game, really. For instance, the “popular” kids play video games like Call of Duty, and that is fine. That video game is associated with guns (cool), violence (cool), action (cool), and other things. But the “geeks” play Pokemon, and that is full of japanese culture (lame), colorful monsters (lame), turn based gameplay (lame), and is designed for a core audience of very young people (lame, and the parenthetical descriptions express the opinion of the “popular”). So, some video games are “cool” while others are “geeky.” There’s a fine line between them; but as stated earlier, anyone can be a Pokemon geek and still be accepted, as long as they can also fit in with the “popular” group.

Like previously discussed, a geek is anyone who has a true passion for something or is an expert in a specific subject. A lot of video games are socially unaccepted, and that’s what some people are geeks about. Considering that these games fall into a “nerdy” category of sorts, they are labelled geeks and then fall into the category. It’s like previously stated, you can be a geek for anything and still be socially accepted, it’s when you’re a geek for something socially unaccepted that you are ostracized, and labelled. 

But this study raises a question too (that will be discussed further in upcoming sections): What if those on the high part of the status quo become geeks for something that is nerdy? Is it’s status raised from nerdy to “cool?” 

Believe it or not, this can happen, and it did too. In fact, the occurance is what inspired me to write this study, to see how something like this could happen.