Week Ten Blog

This is my final blog post and as per the class discussion I will be giving my reactions to the class as well and what I got out of it. I think its great to look at games and the literature that goes with it in an academic setting. I learned a lot and the class let me fall in love with games all over again. There were some games that I just did not care for, but that is not what the class is about. It is about learning the different games and talking about them in an academic setting. That is just what the class did. I learned that table top RPGs are not just for geeks. I really enjoyed running call of cthulhu, and would also love the opportunity to be a player. I would have liked to see where the imagination of the keeper goes as the story progresses. I liked it so much I decided to make a table top based on it for my final project. I am almost finished with it and it is coming along quite nicely. I would have liked to have seen more of the FPS type games as they are my favorite. One of them that I used to play a lot was counterstrike. I would have loved to see some literature come out of that since that is the game I enjoy the most. Another big one is Diablo, with the new release of Diablo 3 it would have been nice to see some literature come out of the first two. I understand that there is limited amount of time in the class, however I did get a lot out of what we did cover and was very impressed by the term. I enjoy games and this class really let me get back into them, and meet new people. I do also wish the class would have met more often as once a week did not seem to do as much justice as I had hoped for. I think that the topic is one that can definitely be explored more as an academic.

WEEK 9 BLOG

Week nine already wow where has the time gone. I decided to write this blog with my ideas for my final project. Still working on finishing grand theft auto 4, seems as though there is a lot on my plate at the moment. I decided for my final project that I am going to make my own table top RPG using the Cthulhu type style. I am going to make the setting on an island and make it all scary. I don't want to give it all away but its going to be prety interesting. I am starting to incorporate the plot and am working on the mystery part of it right now. I am going to use the same stats as the haunted house, except I am going to put specific things you have to roll for to gain information. I am going to try my best to make my game like an onion, to where you are given the story kind of layer by layer. I am finding it difficult, and a challenge, but also interesting and fun at the same time. I think my island is going to be way more fun then just some haunted house. I am actually using the island from the tv series lost, and am using part of the plot from that and part of the plot from a movie called gone. The others from the tv series lost are going to be a group of cultists. I have not worked out all the details but I have found a sort of map from the lost island and am going to piece the story together from both plots to make a super scary, fun haunted island. I just started playing around with different ideas and its coming along quite nicely. I am going to put specific rolls that have to occur to move on and I am going to make it to where the people have to move as one group with different clues as to what the mystery is about at specific locations on the island. I am going to make the island haunted and have black smoke attack just like on the show. I love this idea and am having fun watching it unfold in to a game that should be fun to play. I was also thinking of incorporating time by using an egg timer or something to account for 12 hours per one hour on the egg timer so that time can run its course and I can manipulate time. I want there to be a different demention to the island where people can take a look at different places in different time periods. It is a lot to incorporate in a game so I am having a friend assist me who has played and kept a game before. I have not got to the reading yet as I have a lot to do this weekend but will get it done for class on Wednesday. Happy gaming and good luck everyone with your projects.

Week 8 Blog

I really enjoyed myself being the GM of call of Cthulhu. It was interesting having to make thinks up as I went. It also gives me some ideas for my project. While playing the game I decided to bring some sound effects and used them at the end. We ended the game at the basement and they never found the body. One of the players rolled to leave and could not do it for 3 rolls it was kinda funny. One person ended up dying in the room because I kept drowning them in a waterfall of blood and they could not get the dexterity to get out of the bed. Another player almost finished himself off falling down the broken stairs. I still have yet to finish one of the required games but will do so before class. I got the new Diablo 3 and am spending my weekend break playing that. I really want to make my own table top RPG with the same call of Cthulhu stats and everything, I am not sure of where I will set the setting. One of the players in my game gave me a good idea to take an old cult classic movie and make that into a game, and I thought that would be fun. I love my movies and I love my games, so that would be a great way to incorporate both of them. I was also thinking of doing a choose your own adventure, but that seems like that would be a bit harder to accomplish then making a game. I need to take a look at the final projects more closely on Monday and decide which way I am going to go. I could have my friend help me make a game, he has taken the class before and he is just as much of a geek as I am. Well until next class happy gaming.

Week 7 Blog

ABOUT THE READING In Between Acting and Narrating: Editors' Introduction to "Tabletop Systems," I was supprised at just how popular these table top RPG’s really were. I never got into them myself but have always thought it might be fun to try. I always had this bias though that those kind of games were only for nerds. I was also surprised to learn that many of the RPG’s were available as a PDF and some even were exclusively PDF only. I also learned from this excerpt that there is a Call of Cthulhu card game that was a collectable game. I think it would be interesting to play that if I could ever find it as well as the board game of Call of Cthulhu. In Narrative Structure and Creative Tension in Call of Cthulhu it talks about how the game of Call of Cthulhu is a kind of story telling game rather than a traditional Dungeons & Dragons type game. I am a little worried that I won’t know what I am doing when it comes to leading the game and hope that the material is enough to get me going. I did like how it explained what to do in the reading… 1) A mystery or crisis is posed. . . 2) The investigators become linked to the problem. . . 3) The investigators attempt to define the mystery. . . 4) The investigators use the clues and evidence to confront the danger. . . 5) The mystery or problem is solved. ABOUT THE GAMING I actually downloaded the FPS Call of Cthulhu to see what it was like even though it was not an assignment, I wanted to see what it was like since FPS is my favorite type of game. I enjoyed it although it is a little different than any other FPS that I have ever played. I also have been continuing to play Resident Evil. I got further with the help of some better online players than myself. I like how the levels of Resident Evil seem impossible to finish. I also like that feeling of accomplishment when you finally do beat them. I am really finding it hard to force myself into the story mode of GTA, I have always just liked running around in the world causing havoc. I need to focus more and get the story done and stop getting side tracked with my own adventures.

Week 6 Blog

About the Reading I am seeing a repeating concept of time throughout the study of games and literature in this class. I like how in the story The Call of Cthulhu time is used to set the stage for bazaar dreams. All the dreams of those affected happen all in this period of time between March 22 and 23rd and April 2nd. This story caught my attention because it was something different that I was not used to seeing. I like how in the story Wilcox gets sick and then remembers nothing of his dreams before, as if it had never happened. It leaves you as the reader putting yourself in the narrators shoes thinking that others might think of you as being mad as if it never really happened and it was all in your head. The story leaves a lot to the imagination as far as trying to figure out in my own mind what is going on. It also leaves me to try and put myself in the time period in which the story was told. I found this story to be so interesting I even found an old black and white silent picture movie of it. About the Games I decided that for this part I was going to look at what it would take to run a Call of Cthulhu RPG since I signed up to do so. From what I understand it is kind of like horror meets investigation. Also you have to make things creepy and weird. I don’t know what this game is exactly like but it kind of sounds like fun. And apparently it is really important to understand the H P Lovecraft story. I did get the last Resident Evil game and started playing that a bit. It is an interesting game and is actually pretty hard. I was playing with another person online in this sort of co-op and even then found it difficult. Maybe it is because I am so new to the game, I am not sure. I kept getting stuck with running out of ammo and fumbling with the controls trying to kill things without bullets. Overall it is a fun game and look forward to playing more of it.

Week 4 Blog

Here are the 4 poems I found: The following English sonnet was written by William Shakespeare and is number 18: http://examples.yourdictionary.com/sonnet-examples.html Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wander'st in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st, So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee. VILLANELLE FOR OUR TIME Frank Scott (1899 - 1985)"Villanelle For Our Time" http://www.scribd.com/doc/51599682/Villanelle-for-our-time From bitter searching of the heart,Quickened with passion and with pain We rise to play a greater part. This is the faith from which we start: Men shall know commonwealth again From bitter searching of the heart. We loved the easy and the smart, But now, with keener hand and brain, We rise to play a greater part. The lesser loyalties depart, And neither race nor creed remain From bitter searching of the heart. Not steering by the venal chart That tricked the mass for private gain, We rise to play a greater part. Reshaping narrow law and art Whose symbols are the millions slain, From bitter searching of the heart We rise to play a greater part. Sestina http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/sestina/ September rain falls on the house. In the failing light, the old grandmother sits in the kitchen with the child beside the Little Marvel Stove, reading the jokes from the almanac, laughing and talking to hide her tears. She thinks that her equinoctial tears and the rain that beats on the roof of the house were both foretold by the almanac, but only known to a grandmother. The iron kettle sings on the stove. She cuts some bread and says to the child, It's time for tea now; but the child is watching the teakettle's small hard tears dance like mad on the hot black stove, the way the rain must dance on the house. Tidying up, the old grandmother hangs up the clever almanac on its string. Birdlike, the almanac hovers half open above the child, hovers above the old grandmother and her teacup full of dark brown tears. She shivers and says she thinks the house feels chilly, and puts more wood in the stove. It was to be, says the Marvel Stove. I know what I know, says the almanac. With crayons the child draws a rigid house and a winding pathway. Then the child puts in a man with buttons like tears and shows it proudly to the grandmother. But secretly, while the grandmother busies herself about the stove, the little moons fall down like tears from between the pages of the almanac into the flower bed the child has carefully placed in the front of the house. Time to plant tears, says the almanac. The grandmother sings to the marvelous stove and the child draws another inscrutable house. Elizabeth Bishop September rain falls on the house. In the failing light, the old grandmother sits in the kitchen with the child beside the Little Marvel Stove, reading the jokes from the almanac, laughing and talking to hide her tears. She thinks that her equinoctial tears and the rain that beats on the roof of the house were both foretold by the almanac, but only known to a grandmother. The iron kettle sings on the stove. She cuts some bread and says to the child, It's time for tea now; but the child is watching the teakettle's small hard tears dance like mad on the hot black stove, the way the rain must dance on the house. Tidying up, the old grandmother hangs up the clever almanac on its string. Birdlike, the almanac hovers half open above the child, hovers above the old grandmother and her teacup full of dark brown tears. She shivers and says she thinks the house feels chilly, and puts more wood in the stove. It was to be, says the Marvel Stove. I know what I know, says the almanac. With crayons the child draws a rigid house and a winding pathway. Then the child puts in a man with buttons like tears and shows it proudly to the grandmother. But secretly, while the grandmother busies herself about the stove, the little moons fall down like tears from between the pages of the almanac into the flower bed the child has carefully placed in the front of the house. Time to plant tears, says the almanac. The grandmother sings to the marvelous stove and the child draws another inscrutable house. Elizabeth Bishop Evening Harmony Pantoum - http://poetry.about.com/gi/o.htm?zi=1/XJ&zTi=1&sdn=poetry&cdn=education&tm=12&f=00&tt=14&bt=0&bts=0&zu=http%3A//fleursdumal.org/poem/142 The season is at hand when swaying on its stem Every flower exhales perfume like a censer; Sounds and perfumes turn in the evening air; Melancholy waltz and languid vertigo! Every flower exhales perfume like a censer; The violin quivers like a tormented heart; Melancholy waltz and languid vertigo! The sky is sad and beautiful like an immense altar. The violin quivers like a tormented heart, A tender heart, that hates the vast, black void! The sky is sad and beautiful like an immense altar; The sun has drowned in his blood which congeals... A tender heart that hates the vast, black void Gathers up every shred of the luminous past! The sun has drowned in his blood which congeals... Your memory in me glitters like a monstrance! — William Aggeler, The Flowers of Evil (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954) About the reading: I am completely uninformed of these types of poetry and am unsure what to make of them without some explanation of the reasons we were reading these and how they pertain to games. They are different from the kinds of poems I would normally read in that they seem to tell a story. I am interested in finding out more about these types of literature so that I can understand more of how they relate to my gaming experience. The last one stood out in my mind as I am being walked through the description of a plant or flower almost as if the point of the poem is to try and get me to guess which plant it is. It seems that the relation to games in this poem may be to play the part of a detective and figure out the riddle. I may be way off base but that is the direction that this poem seems to take with me in my mind. The poem by Elizabeth Bishop it seems like this is some sort of puzzle of words and layer upon layer you find out how each part of the puzzle relates to the other rain to tears to the almanac and everything between forming a sort of relationship of how they are all intertwined. The Shakespeare poem was a little difficult to understand and I am not sure how to interpret it without analyzing what it means in the first place. The VILLANELLE that I found seems like it kind of rhymes but yet it doesn't, and it seems to repeat words in a way that I personally would not do naturally almost as if the poem is circular in motion. All are interesting and I can't wait to learn more about them and how they came to be. About the game: Started playing braid and it has some aspects of something that might be fun but it seems to torment you as you are playing it. The game teases you with finding pieces of a puzzle when at times they seem impossible to get. This game takes a look again at the time aspect which I do like if I wasn't constantly being mocked that I am not doing the game right. I am not sure if that is the point...to frustrate you... but if it was it worked. I will continue to play and find out if the parts of the puzzle I could not figure out how to get are completely necessary or if they are meant to make you spin your wheels for a while. I got to this one part on what seemed to be a cloud bridge and there was a puzzle beneath me that made me fall. I wasn't sure how to get the two pieces of the puzzle or why I kept falling with no way to get them. This kind of frustrated me and made me not want to play. I don't really know the point yet of the game so I will continue because it is an assignment, but not because I like it.

Week Three Blog

ABOUT THE READING I found the Fretting the Character to be interesting in that it shows the relationship between the player and the game. I never thought of playing a game as being just a person steering a character. I guess that is what you are doing, but I have always thought about it as just playing. The writer kind of lost me when he was talking about the IF, then I realized he was talking about interactive fiction. When he was talking about Book and Volume he said that it was supposed to spark some sense of motivation, but I was not motivated in the slightest. Reading through the script of the game even left me wondering, what is the point? I am a nonconformist anyway, and do not like being confined to what the author has in store for me and what I should do, especially if I have to think and create the environment in my own head. Is Book and Volume a game or a story? When I read Interactive Fiction that is what I found myself asking. I think that if it looks like a story and feels like a story it must be a story. The game doesn’t let you go your own way it has a predefined destination that you need to adhere to. ABOUT THE GAMES I am not a big fan of the whole read and imagine sort of games. In fact this is the first time having engaged such a game first hand. I mean you are simply engaging in text, I can’t even possibly see how anyone would find this fun let alone amusing. There is also this sort of condescending attitude when you do something wrong as if you are an idiot and don’t know how to interact in real life. My mother always taught me If you have nothing nice to say don’t say it at all. I don’t have a whole lot of anything nice to say about this game, so we will leave it at that.