Unfettered Blather

I know some people don’t like the phrase “Your own worst enemy” but I keep seeing evidence of how true this is.

The problem with fandom is that ultimately it begins to fester (not “foster”) a feeling of entitlement. Fans begin to develop expectations that are going to be a detriment to the success of whatever franchise they feel so emotionally invested in. I’m not really sure why fans continue to do this. Businesses have made it clear that if they have to choose between making fans happy and being profitable they’ll choose the money every time. They are not evil for doing so. They have employees with families to consider. Making fans happy and making money can be the same thing but when its not the fans will lose. What many fans continue to not grasp is that they are a minority. They think they are a majority but echo chambers always amplify the noise. Loud in volume but small in number, they have appointed themselves the keeper of intellectual properties they do not own and defend them fiercely despite a continual disregard for the very existence of the fans by the real owners of those properties.

I scratch my head and wonder at how thick people can be to detest a thing because it isn’t exactly what they wanted. Most recently it was Fallout 3 for me, a perfectly awesome game that did depart somewhat from the originals, but I think the originals are being regarded a bit too highlt. My favorite example is the Lord of the Rings movie trilogy. Again, I think the fans views are distorted. I re-read the Lord of the Rings and was quickly reminded how much fluff and nonsensical crap was in it. Tolkein, great writer that he was, could become obsessed describing the moss on a rock. As I re-read the books I found myself skipping entire paragraphs as he insisted on painstakingly describing the landscape. The landscape! Fans cried foul that there was no Tom Bombadil, but I didn’t even miss him. Guess I’m not a fan? Doesn’t matter, I’m there for the experience, the story, the entertainment. I acknowledge that Peter Jackson took some liberties with Lord of the Rings but he also made the best fantasy film series I’ve ever seen while staying true to the source material.

Let’s tackle Fallout while we’re at it. I’m pretty sure people are remembering these games better than they were. I have people now telling me how great Fallout: Tactics was and how much they missed it. That seems pretty different from the cries of blasphemy when the game was first produced. Does it get a pass now because it was yet another isometric 2D sprite game? What makes Fallout 3 such an abomination but Fallout: Tactics is so fondly remembered? I have many people tell me Fallout 2 is one of the best games they ever played. Was I playing something else? What I remember was a game that crashed repeatedly, had game crippling bugs, and could easily take 10 minutes or more to load a game or area because of a memory leak that shipped in the game. Most of these issues were patched out later, but the first run of the game was horribly broken. Even after it was patched, the game setting itself was horribly inconsistent, as if the designers had run out of ideas and decided to just abandon the idea of a post-apocalyptic nuclear wasteland whenever it became inconvenient. The whole game smacked of trying too hard. I’m not saying Fallout 2 was horrible, at least not once it was patched, but it was hardly the same level of genius as the original game.

If anything, Fallout 3 is the closest to the original game despite abandoning the classic top-down isometric perspective and opting for a first-person view. It leverages modern technology to make an attempt at a more immersive experience. For the most part it works and the game is genius in its own right. Yet the fans are going to turn up their noses and sneer at it because it wasn’t done the way they wanted?

Here’s the real problem. No two fans are going to agree completely. Companies don’t try to make fans happy because it’s impossible. If being a fan means I have to actually stop enjoying the things I enjoy now, I hope to never be a fan again.

One of the reasons I did not jump on the bandwagon and get Rock Band sooner was because when the game was first released the reports of poor peripheral reliability made it seem like a dodgy proposition. Guitars routinely had problems and the drum set bass pedal was prone to snapping in half, literally. Furthermore, by the time Rock Band had hit my radar they were talking Guitar Hero 4 and how it was going to offer drums and vocals and all the instruments would be wireless. I admit I don’t enjoy the regular feeding of batteries into my 360 guitar controllers the wireless capability has been a blessing. I pulled the PS2 off the shelf one time when I got a little too much into Psychobilly Freakout. Embarrassing to be sure but at least it’s evident that I really enjoy these games.

Harmonix met the challenge and criticisms by announcing their own wireless controllers and so the stage was set. I don’t think I’ve ever made a franchise decision based on peripherals before but considering the monetary investment it was hard to ignore. I know I preferred Harmonix’s Guitar Hero II to Neversoft’s Guitar Hero III, but if Harmonix didn’t fix their quality issues then it was a moot point.

Well, Harmonix did fix their quality issue and once i was assured of that I picked up a used stand-alone copy of Rock Band and fell in love with it. I see Guitar Hero II as the pinnacle of that franchise and was having a hard time seeing anyone, even Harmonix, improve on the formula. Yet even the guitar portions of Rock Band alone were superior to Guitar Hero II. Harmonix has continued to tweak their formula and mechanics with the intent of simulating the rock star fantasy. Their philosophy couldn’t be any more different than Neversoft.

As the reviews have poured in the one thing that stands out for me, even when its praised, is that Guitar Hero: World Tour is entirely too intent on being a game where music is the gameplay and Rock Band is a game about being a musician. Rock Band is about pure unadulterated fun where Guitar Hero has turned into something that wouldn’t seem out of place in an arcade demanding quarters for you to continue after throwing an impossibly hard section at you. Harmonix seems intent on giving players a fun experience and finding new ways to introduce those experiences without altering the core gameplay mechanics and yet keeping it as authentic as possible. Neversoft seems intent to make sure players never forget their playing a game and the rock star fantasy is a secondary concern. Furthermore, Neversoft’s note charts seem more intent on being difficult and game-like than authentic. Ironic considering World Tour has the ability to make music and Rock Band 2 does not.

I also take issue with the World Tour drum set. I used to play drums and I grit my teeth when people say that World Tour’s set seems more like a real drum set. Sure, if you’ve never played before it might LOOK like a real drum set but it doesn’t really simulate one all that well. You can actually buy cymbal attachments for Rock Band’s drum kit, but even without it provides a much more authentic drumming experience. I’m not a big fan of its instrument substitution mentality (ex: The yellow pad alternates between being your high hat and leftmost tom) but the general set-up, especially when you’re doing fills, feels very natural to me. World Tour’s drum set is realistic at a superficial level only.

Somewhat ironically, Neversoft or Activision have not learned lessons Harmonix learned for them. The World Tour peripherals have been reported to have numerous problems, which is actually surprising to me. Then again, the first wireless guitar I got when I bought Guitar Hero III had a lot of problems to, so maybe the quality issues have been around since Activision changed direction on the franchise. Also, a lot of the frustrations from Rock Band return in World Tour despite Harmonix addressing them in Rock Band 2. While I would Neversoft to come up with their own direction, it is surprising to see them make the same mistakes their rival has already made for them. I guess what surprises me most of all is how punishing and rigid World Tour seems to be. It is not friendly for mixed groups where some people might be more casual players than others. It is not a game I would fire up if I had visitors at the house who wanted to bang away on the drums. Rock Band 2, on the other hand, is a perfect party game, fitting in nicely with Guitar Hero II and Boom Blox for a party game on almost every system. (I have no “party” games for the old X-Box, alas)

I am a huge fan of Guitar Hero, enough that I enjoyed Guitar Hero III even though it was less focused on “fun” than previous iterations. It had a strong song list and was close enough to the old Harmonix formula to still be enjoyable despite some really poor decisions (BATTLES!!!). Neversoft has had time to listen to the criticisms and has twice released games (Aerosmith and World Tour) that essentially thumbs their noses and deliver the game experience they want to deliver and not one that seems to make consumers happy. Hey, this is not haute couture. Guitar Hero has always been about Top 20 Greatest Hit mass market songs. To an extent, consumer feedback and criticism is important. Considering the sales of Guitar Hero continues to slide and review scores have also been sliding it is past time for Neversoft to clean up their act or Activision needs to hand this off to a development team that will do it right. Until one of those things happen I am done with the Guitar Hero franchise.

We are in the midst of another election cycle and with it we are inundated with campaigns to bring those that normally wouldn’t vote in to the fold. This included everything from motivational commercials and celebrity appearences right down to voting scams run by the likes of Acorn.

I think voting is one of the most important fuctions a citizen can perform. It is a responsibility and what these ad campaigns fail to convey is that you have to be educated about the process, your ethics, beliefs and how they pretain to the issues.

Let me make a particular point on the “undecided voter” buzzword.

If you’re undecided, you’re an idiot.

Look, I’ve tried to be pleasant and understanding in my views of undecided voters but at this point in my life, especially with the two party system, we have a very distinct divide between most candidates. If you have even a small list of moral or ethical values you adhere to, with a modicum of reading you can establish a decision in fairly short order.

Some could argue the two party system is a detriment, my only interest in it for this argument is that it makes your voting choice remarkably easy. The bulk of the important issues the candidates almost always disagree on. Spare me the schlock where you need to “Wait and see”. For what exactly? You don’t know by election day? That to me is unsettling.

If you tell me you haven’t decided a week before the election then odds are I’m going to shake my head. Its like people saying they have done no studying before the big test and think that it is perfectly okay.

This may sound cynical but if you pay any attention to politics (unless you are one of those “I don’t talk politics or religion” dimwits) then you have a thin if reasonable clue as to what the fundamentals are. If you are waiting to view their family habits or read these stupid human interest stories about their home life and dog then you aren’t making a political decision. This isn’t a popularity contest where the guy with the nicest smile and talks the best wins.

I have been involved with politics for most of my life, even as a kid. Most people find it a pain in the ass, but thats life. It has been the same for a long time with the media only making it spectacle and biased but the issue is simple. Its not always fun. Then again neither is driving to work in traffic or paying the bills. The difference is, some rightfully see it as their job, their duty to wade through the waist deep sea of spin and bullcrap to make a decision for their country. To demand change. People who are apathetic make this more difficult, even worse are those that pull the lever blindly.

Finally I’m sick of this crap about the underprivileged being “left behind”. Want to vote? It is not difficult to make that happen. We have a very fair and easily accessible voting system and the attached drama over people being excluded is often spouted by people who really think this country is unfair to the poor across the board. It simply isn’t true.

If you want to vote, you will vote, if you are too lazy or don’t care then you won’t and thats exactly how it’s supposed to work. I’m all for helping up those that want a helping hand, but if you have to beat them over the head about it’s importance, gather them like cattle and bus them down there then frankly I don’t want them voting regardless of income. There has to be personal initiative in voting. If Democratic or Republican supporters are trying to bus people to the polls and influencing them as best they can, then they want vote punchers and respect is not attached to that label.

We dither about having everyone’s voices are heard. Frankly I want a fair number of them to shut-up and go home so I can hear the voices of the people they are drowning out. The people who have something to say because they care about the system.

Voting is for the educated. That is the responsibility of the voter, to be educated. If you refuse to accept this then do not vote. Do everyone else the favor. Educating yourself and making a real, honest decision with a personal desire to see your country succeed is a requirement.

I listen to people complain about politics. Frankly the status quo is our fault. The politicians know there is a harvest of people out there that will vote based on nothing more than window dressing.We take voting for granted and it is being abused by the parties to win through media circus, bias and infomercials. This is a testament to the problem with the voting public, not politics. I may think being an undecided voter makes you a bit thick or complaicent, but thats nothing compared to what the candidates see you as.

I know it’s fashionable to bag on web comics these days, but beating them over the head seems rather like singling out one clown in an entire circus for ridicule. Before we are too harsh on web comics lets think of all the user contributed media out there people are “sharing” and wasting untold amounts of bandwidth on. Do a random Youtube search using the words “high school” or “college” the next time you want to talk about how crappy web comic efforts are or look up random crap sites like ebaums.

That being said I am going to make a few comments on some things that I dislike about web comics, not to get tangental, but to point out that it really is the simplest things that makes a web comic entertaining.

I generally don’t read web comics much anymore but I used to have a rather large cadre I would visit on a daily basis. My commentary is strictly from the view of a reader, mainly because it feels like the same formulaic media. The flip side is, just like most traditional media, it is neither clever or funny (I call it “Jimmy Fallon Disease”).

1. Its not just about the comic. Web comics aren’t just about making the reader chuckle. That idea is as outdated as the comics printed in traditional media. Most are visual blogs for the author and if the author doesn’t have something relevant to say then the comic will suffer. I’ve seen some solid comics with no associated blog post. It feels detached. I’m not saying every comic has to have a phone book attached, but seeing the comic relate to something real or personal, even being told the motivation will suffice.

2. Stop selling us your crap. I’m a big free enterprise guy and I believe we should be able to succeed at what we love. That being said, web comics often feel like shallow vessels to sell T-shirts, posters, advertising space and whatever else the author can peddle. A lot of comics build a fan base they usually evolve in to milking for cash. This isn’t always cynical or crass, sometimes they fail to realize it until it’s too late.

This is one of the primary reasons I barely read Penny-Arcade anymore. While I’ve always gone there for Tycho’s post (and still do - I love good writing), the old Penny-Arcade where the two authors bounced conversations off each other and complimented posts are gone. Tycho posts, Gabe shills whatever crap they are going to put on ebay, sell at their expo or print on t-shirts. There is always a balance to your success. If you are popular enough to sell merchandise, then by all means do it, but retain some sense of pride in your work and avoid the Krusty the Clown route of slapping your logo on anything and attaching a price tag. If you are too busy trying to run a business based on a comic to the extent your aren’t maintaining the concept, thats rather a serious dilemma isn’t it?

3. I don’t really care about your problems I read web comics for the same reason I read blogs, to read news, find amusing or interesting information or a new insight. What I do not care about is your daily nonsense where you try to evoke empathy or sympathy from me. Want to angst? Go to live journal or myspace. Few people ever devolve in to the sniveling mess that Tokyo Pop became, but there are plenty of examples of mainstream comics forgetting that the audience has limited patience for sorry excuses.

If you do become a success, spare us the details of why you are too busy to write the comics or have writer’s block, it’s just lame in the extreme. The comics comes first, thats what made you what you are.

4.Cheap, distasteful or bathroom humor I’m no prude, I love black humor and cynicism. I can also appreciate a fart joke if it’s done well enough but a lot of web comics take the easy way out and use human waste or shock value as a means to fill out their line-up. Part of this is to display they are “edgy”, a term best classified as “being rebellious in a completely conformist way”. Every web comic seems to do it at least once to show they aren’t newspaper friendly. The phrase “everybody gets one” comes to mind but after a while if you keep hammering the same theme or simply trying to be offensive in the most trite way possible, it gets tired. The Internet is built on body odor humor and shock value so please don’t think your attempt at it is unique or funny

5. Consistency sells. While I am less consistent because of my random life, Jason has always been a huge proponent of consistency in web efforts ever since we started talking and working on websites together. Websites aren’t graveyards, but active, living entities. It is rare Jason doesn’t post daily here. Most of all, he doesn’t complain how life isn’t fair or he is just out of things to say. A lot of blogs and comics do this and nothing could possibly be more uninteresting..

One of the great memorable lines I remember from the 2004 election was an American expatriate who, upon finding out we re-elected George W. Bush, said “In a Democracy, we get the government we deserve”.

Much has been said about who is to blame for the Financial “Crisis” (I prefer “Meltdown” personally). It is the Democrats’ fault for forcing banks to give out high risk loans so people could buy housing. It’s the Republicans’ fault for de-regulating the financial markets. Then we get the entire bailout mess. Whether you are for or against it, am I the only one who is outraged that the exact same bill that was voted down was then passed once the appropriate bribes were handed out? Not only that, but the government is now on a four month break! I got to listen to a Democratic Congresswoman complain about how unemployment was going to go up while the House was on their four month break. Then don’t go on break! What kind of job let’s you walk away from a crisis for a third of a year?!

In the end you could say that both parties have plenty of blame to go around, but in the end I think I know who really is to blame for this whole mess. The American Voting Public. You see, years ago I used to rant and rave about the failures of our two party system. I argued that the system was anti-competitive and operated in the interests of the respective parties and not the country as a whole. I saw people who identified as Democrats or Republicans as part of the problem, since politicians had grown accustomed to their unwavering support. Sure, you always have those people who say they are one party then make a big deal of voting for the other guy. I’m not talking about those people. I’m talking about people who vote a straight party ticket without even knowing who is on the ballot or what the different members of their esteemed party have been responsible for as they blindly pull the lever. Amazing how the people who most ardently identify with a party are the educated upper middle class and higher. Why are our most educated and well-to-do the most loyal and sheeplike of our society? I would expect people who are educated to be able to think for themselves. Is there some failing in our education system?

Regardless, I am tired of this mess and I am tired of the weak excuses people give me for voting the same people into office despite their lack of effectiveness. Don’t you get it? Voting out the incumbent, regardless of party affiliation, sends a clear message to Washington D.C. that we’re tired of this crap. We’re tired of our so-called “representatives” ignoring us. Yet they’ll continue to ignore us until we take away their jobs. You vote out the incumbents who are profitting from running the country into the ground and ruining the lives of ordinary Americans and then you put up with someone not from your party for one-term and then you can let your party back in once they realize that they need to behave themselves.

Right now there is no incentive for our government to clean up their act because they believe that they’ll always have a job. That Republican or Democrat who has held office longer than I’ve been alive is so convinced you won’t vote for the other party that they use it as a form of blackmail to get your vote. “If you don’t vote for me, then that other party will get more power.” Can you honestly tell the difference between the two anymore? Can you not see that the Democrats and Republicans, despite their very real loathing for each other, actually work together to play the American people against each other and block us from choosing new leaders?

We don’t need an armed revolution. Our government was structured in such a manner that we can choose our own leaders, and we have consistently chosen to not exercise that option. If you’re tired of how your Representative and Senator behaves, vote them out! If we actually had leaders who cared more about this country than lining their pockets we wouldn’t be in this mess. However, it is our failure as voters to get rid of poor leaders that got us into this mess. Until we take the necessary steps to replace this incompetent gaggle of fools we have only ourselves to blame.