Archives

Some things I’ve scanned and uploaded to Archive.org

I’ve been trying to keep somewhat productive during the pandemic (until my gallbladder started acting up but I’m fine now). Rather than writing or researching, I did something easier: scanning in stuff and uploading it to archive.org. I’ve mostly scanned in posters that came with issues of Edge magazine. I don’t know if they still do these but for several years they would do wall calendars that had Nintendo themes on them. I’ve scanned in all the Edge posters so now I’m starting to scan in a few other things (and I may have uploaded some pdfs that I didn’t scan).

So if anyone has any interest in them, here they are: https://archive.org/details/@jccalhoun

E-sports in odd places

The other day I was at work waiting on the microwave to finish and glanced over at the recycling bin and noticed an issue of Ed Tech magazine. Now I had never heard of this magazine but the cover caught my eye:

An article on how a college IT staff can help launch an esports team. I had to grab it out of recycling and make a copy of it.

So, in violation of all sorts of copyright, here is the article:

The article ends with a link to their website where they have a whitepaper on esports.

Educational Games

I have been skeptical about educational games. I’ve also been skeptical about “serious games” (I used to say I was more interested in “frivolous games” but it never seemed to catch on). I’ve also been down on narrative in games.

So it should come as no surprised that last semester I taught a course on videogame narrative where I had students play games with narratives and serious games.

It was an interesting experience not only because I was teaching something I wasn’t super into but also because I had been working on my main teaching gig so much that I barely had time to create the syllabus for this class. So for the first time in many years I was teaching a week ahead of what I was reading.

It ended up being a fun class if a bit chaotic. I’ll post my syllabus below if anyone is interested in it.

I was most proud of how I turned educational games on their head. Instead of having students play educational games I had them make games that illustrate the concepts of the course and I think it worked really well.

I’m not a programmer and I didn’t want to set any expectations of my student’s computer skills so I had them use Twine. There was a learning curve so I had them make a basic game and I also made a little tutorial twine as well as a google doc with a bunch of twine resources.

The games they made weren’t super polished. We kind of ran out of time and if I teach it again I will really try to give them more time to revise it. However, they were really creative and interesting. So here are the games my students made.

Here is the calendar and readings for the class:

ReadingsGamesAssignments
Monday, August 27, 2018cambridge intro to narrativeAdam Cadre’s Interactive Fiction Tutorial http://adamcadre.ac/if/tutorial.html
Wednesday, August 29, 2018zork lebling1979 and Interactive Fiction how is it differentThe Time Machine: A Chad, Matt & Rob Interactive Adventure!
Wednesday, September 5, 2018Narrative interactivity play and games ZimmermanZork
Monday, September 10, 2018Half-Real Juul IntroductionChoices
Wednesday, September 12, 2018Half-Real Juul Chapter 2
Monday, September 17, 2018Half-Real Juul Chapter 4dys4ia https://freegames.org/dys4ia/
Wednesday, September 19, 2018Games Telling stories
Monday, September 24, 2018Ludology meet narratologyWe Become What We Behold https://ncase.itch.io/wbwwb
Wednesday, September 26, 2018gamestorytelling and breaking the string costikyan
Monday, October 1, 2018Video Games Are Better Without StoriesMy Horse Prince https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/my-horse-prince/id1173408461 https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=jp.usaya.prince.en
Wednesday, October 3, 2018Character Development chapter 7 
Monday, October 8, 2018Character Development chapter 14The Future of Football 17776 https://www.sbnation.com/a/17776-football
Wednesday, October 10, 2018Writing Interactive Fiction with Twine Excerpts2018-10-05-nohighlights.docx 
Monday, October 15, 2018Doki Doki Literature Club http://ddlc.moe/
Wednesday, October 24, 2018Character Development sections.docx 
Monday, October 29, 2018Character Development chapter 12Her Story http://www.herstorygame.com/
Wednesday, October 31, 2018interactive storytelling for videogames lebowitz klug chapter 2
Monday, November 5, 2018interactive storytelling for videogames lebowitz klug chapter 4A Normal Lost Phone http://anormallostphone.com/
Wednesday, November 7, 2018interactive storytelling for videogames lebowitz klug chapter 5
Monday, November 12, 2018Video Game Storytelling – Evan Skolnick excerpts80 days https://www.inklestudios.com/80days/
Wednesday, November 14, 2018SLAY THE DRAGON chapter 2Class Prep Activityalpha of group game due playtesting game
Monday, November 26, 2018SLAY THE DRAGON chapter 3Gone Home https://gonehome.game/
Wednesday, November 28, 2018SLAY THE DRAGON chapter 6

I don’t even pirate any more

Back in the day I used to pirate a decent number of games but I don’t any more. It isn’t because I turned over a new leaf or stopped playing games. No, it is because I have so many free games that I can’t play them all. Between freebies that places like Humblebundle, Steam, and GoG give away from time to time and Twitch giving away games every month, I just don’t bother pirating games.

I used to either pirate a game or just wait until it was on sale but now I just play the free games or the same old games like Overwatch or even Civ V.

So maybe the solution to piracy isn’t DRM which only serves to inconvenience people who actually buy the game. Maybe the solution is just to give away so many games that you can’t play them all? I mean that might not work well for their bottom line but it has certainly has minimized my piracy…

Still alive

I was taking care of some spam and thought I would post to prove I am still alive. I’m teaching at a community college and I’m trying to decide where I want to go with my professional life. I’m working on a couple things that I hope to get out in the next month or so.

September 2017 update post! woooo

Long time without posting. You know, life gets in the way.

Teaching, trying to revise a paper only to have it end up rejected…. playing games, trying to find a full time job.

Been trying to play Overwatch but my internet has been really laggy lately so that doesn’t work too well.

Playing through The Witcher 3 now that I have a good computer. Like it a lot (I”m through the main game and now I’m doing the DLC). However, at times I do find myself wishing it there was some Assassin’s Creed-style running across rooftops. In games like these I always feel weird going into an NCP’s house and stealing stuff as they stand there. I know some games have had things where the NCPs react to it (and there are times in Witcher 3 where guards will attack you for stealing) but I wish it was more common. Maybe at some point we will get a game where some of these “gamey” limitations are gone. It would change how the game is played for sure but it would still be an interesting game to play.

Alien: Isolation Review

I had heard a lot about how good Alien: Isolation was and I knew that it had won a ton of awards so I had high expectations for it. After playing it, I have to say I’m kind of baffled. I liked the game but, man, is it long and repetitive. How many times can you be sent on a fetch quest only to have that plan turn out not to work and then have to go on another fetch quest?

Some minor spoilers here…

To be honest, I’m most confounded by articles like this one by Danielle Riendeau because I have respected and enjoyed her work so much. (Am I so out of touch? …no, its the reviewers who are wrong.) So as much as I hate to do it, I think that digging into her post will help me to organize my thoughts on why I was so disappointed in the game (I’m not mad. I’m just disappointed)

Riendeau writes,

“[Alien: Isolation is] a truly bold, risky, brilliant game that only fails when it remembers it’s a video game.”

My problem is that it never forgets it’s a video game. I will explain why I felt this way in my subsequent comments.

“There are other enemies in Isolation: devastated, scared humans with guns, creepy androids that kill you in brutal ways — but there’s really only one that matters. The one that hunts you down wherever you go.”

I found those other enemies incredibly irritating. People shooting at you. Robots that go crazy. They are felt like artificial reason to make you crawl into a vent and make a detour instead of going directly to your goal. I have to go flip this switch. Just get out of my way and stop bothering me you stupid robot.

Isolation is a game where shooting a gun almost always means certain death. Where one singular creature — that cannot be killed — stalks the player, almost entirely unscripted, throughout the experience.”

While it is true that shooting a gun often means death because it will attract the alien, the second part of this is false. Maybe Riendeau didn’t want to give away things but you do in fact kill the Alien. Oh but guess what? It isn’t “one singular creature.” There turns out to be a hive and there are multiple Aliens.

“Make a woman hero that shows her character through actions, not cutscenes”

I recognize that a lot of this is about the main character being a woman. That’s great. That’s awesome. The more the better. However, the second half of this really confounds me. There are way to damn many cut scenes in Alien: Isolation. It really infuriated me. I’m sure that most of the cut scenes are to cover up for the limitations of the game engine but it was just frustrating when you get ready to go so something and you have to watch a movie. They even show animations of you crawling into vents or opening doors — which you do a lot and so you see them a lot. Ugh.

If the game was half as long, or had half as many fetch quests that end up failing or fewer cut scenes then I would have liked it as much as Riendeau did. I guess it comes down to what we focus on because I totally agree with Danielle when she writes:

“[Alien: Isolation is] way too long, with obvious filler content. I put in around 28 hours. Most playthroughs are likely closer to the 20-25 hour mark. This is way too long for a horror game that is 100% focused on being a tense, difficult experience.

Far worse is the inclusion of cheap, frustrating enemies in a few sections of the game. It’s tarnish on the better-designed sections. They’re a boring, rote, frustrating feature that belongs in a cheap haunted house.”

She still loves the game despite these things. I can’t love it because of them.

 

three thumbs up

Stupid Alien
I dislike disliking you
Need to cut it down.

 

 

What I’m playing november 2016

I’ve been busy teaching so I haven’t done much blogging but I have managed to play some games. I thought I would post what I’m playing as a way to get a new post on here to prove this site isn’t dead – if only to myself.

1. Paladins – people say it is an Overwatch clone but I wouldn’t know because I haven’t bought Overwatch. From what I’ve seen Overwatch seems like Team Fortress 2.5 anyway – shots fired! Overwatch is entertaining enough. It is free to play so it has that going for it. It is in beta so they keep changing things which is kind of interesting to observe.

2. Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker – I have never been that big of a Nintendo fan. I had an NES but never an SNES. I got an N64 several years after it was out and never had a Gamecube. Now that the Wii U is nearly dead I decided to buy a Wii and softmod it. So I’ve started playing through the gamecube games I’ve missed. Wind Waker is the first one. I think the only other Zelda game I ever played was Link to the Past that a guy in the dorm in college had on his SNES so it has been an interesting experience. I’m currently at the part where you gether the triforce. It is getting a little tedious so I might give up on it.

3. Alien: Isolation – I heard a lot of praise for this so I was looking forward to it. I’m not quite sure what to make of it. The gameplay seems really straight forward and I don’t like the mini cut scenes that pop up or the pre-scripted story elements. Avoiding the Alien and other things can be quite tense but after it keeps coming back it gets monotonous (or tedious? I guess I should look up the difference between those! Hmmm… well this isn’t any help: “As adjectives the difference between monotonous and tedious is that monotonous is having an unvarying tone or pitch while tedious is boring, monotonous, time consuming, wearisome.” Merriam Webster states that monotonous means “used to describe something that is boring because it is always the same” while tedious is “boring and too slow or long.” So I guess I feel Wind Waker is becoming tedious while Alien: Isolation is becoming monotonous? One think I do know is that this post is becoming tedious!)

4. Candy Crush Soda – I guess it says something about my own perception of what counts as a “real game” that I didn’t originally think to include this or the other android games I play. I was playing Pokemon GO but they banned rooted phones so I can’t play any more. I would like to play Inkle’s Sorcery 4 but I know I would get too into it. Maybe over Thanksgiving. I’ve been thinking about how to use their Inkle Writer in my classes as a way to have students make games that revolve around a theme in the course. It looks more plug and play than twine. I don’t know that I’ve figured out what to use it for tough.

Analog keyboard may become a real thing?

I meant to post this a while ago but I never got around to it until now (when I’m procrastinating instead of dealing with the stress of actually submitting a paper to a journal).

A little over a year ago I posted my idea for an analog keyboard. Well, I ran across a post on PCPerspective about a kickstarter for an analog keyboard. I’m poor so I didn’t back it. And I generally stay away from kickstarting hardware.

More interesting is that I wasn’t exactly the first person to have the idea for an analog keyboard (not that I really thought I was). As it turns out, back in 2012 the Ben Heck Show made their own analog keyboard and in the video they show it working basically how I thought it would:

Analog WASD Gaming Keyboard – The Ben Heck Show by BenHeckShow

Maybe some day one of these will actually be available in stores. Now we just need rumble mice…