If you don't know about this site, tvtropes.org is something you should check out at some point. It's an awful lot like Wikipedia in some ways, and yet completely different. It's a listing of devices used in media, and while the site began listing ones used in television programs, it has since expanded to include other mediums. Video game tropes make up a large part of their site, and it's really interesting to look through and see just how common a particularly loved or hated plot device has expanded beyond your game.
The title in question is something that has always bothered me since the dawn of gaming. Guide Dang It! is a device that described when a player can only come up with the solution to a problem or the means of obtaining something by using a guide, since conventional and common sense approaches just don't work.
Take Shadowgate, for instance. The old NES classic was not only difficult and threatening, but the sheer abuse of power made this game a frustrating beast for gamers at the time. Should you wander into a room carrying the wrong item on your person, you'd die. If you were stuck at a dead end and there was a device at the dead end needing activation, a player could attempt to go through their item stack to see what presented a solution. Only problem is that the player could be killed by using any of the wrong items. It's just tough to play this game without feeling like a masochist, and that's not even the best example.
Which brings me to the Zodiac Spear. Sure, there were guides and FAQs available for this game the second that is was released. Imagine that you bought this game and headed off to a cabin with no internet, phone, or guide. Would you ever find the Zodiac Spear or know of its existence? Without a guide, and if everyone who worked on the game shut up, would anyone have found it? For those who don't know what the weapon is, it's one of the ultimate weapons in the game, and while there are a couple methods to get it, the widely accepted version of acquiring the item involves you not opening certain treasure chests in the game. Within the game, there are no hints about this.
Which leads me to wonder, what is the point of guides? It's been suggested that guide makers pressure developers to sneak these secrets in to sell guides, but there are too many games (specifically RPGs) that include secret stashes of items or special endings requiring the player to be absurdly obsessive. I consider myself to be a capable gamer with a pretty decent melon, but sometimes I will sit there playing an RPG wondering why it's second nature for me to have the guide before I even begin.
To take this point further, this doesn't bother me so much if the game is completable without a guide. If I can beat the game without a guide and still discover the full extent of the story, then I don't bother unless I'm completely stuck on how to advance in the game (which is rare). If I can advance on my own, I'd rather not use a guide, and as you can probably tell from previous posts, I don't have a fascination with ultimate weapons. Generally, by the time I can get it, I don't really need it anyway. Some game secrets are specifically designed to pair with a guide and meant for only obsessive completists. So, unless there's a huge plot secret or a secret ending, guides don't make sense to me.
That's when it pisses me off, though. It's when developers put these super-secret paths into their games and apply story weight to them that truly pisses me off. If there's some random hidden room that contains the key to the "true ending", or a character that needs recruiting so that you can face the real final boss, sometimes it's obvious to the player, and sometimes it's anything but. I seriously wonder at times why a developer would choose to put something vital in a game and require that the player be insane to have figured out how to get it. I know that selling guides is a factor, but who comes up with some of this stuff expecting a regular player to come up with a solution on their own? Go to GameFAQs and look up secrets for the latest Fire Emblem game and tell me that you know somebody who would have discovered this stuff on their own with no help whatsoever.
It makes me curious, though. How many huge game secrets for legacy games have honestly been discovered by players and not leaked out by the companies themselves? Are there any game secrets that have been left undiscovered? On top of that, there's the reverse question of what would happen if, hypothetically, Squeenix released Final Fantasy XIII without a guide. Would players have any clue about getting ultimate weapons, summons, and side-quests? How would that pan out?
Finally, I'd like to see a game be challenging by avoiding guides altogether. To clarify, I think that someone out there should experiment with a guide-proof game, forcing the player to get creative and to explore the game on their own terms rather than having their hand held. Some players out there rely on guides for survival and completion without using brainpower. I've seen it happen where a friend will get a brand spanking new game complete with guide, and every time that game is played the guide is open. How is that playing a game, and have games become so shady in their structure that guides are a required game tool?
On the topic of how to make a game guide-proof, I've had some pretty good ideas in the past. Randomization is part of the equation, but alone it's an entirely broken idea. If you have to do something at a certain location, then a guide can always help you so long as you can find that location. If an enemy shows up in a different place each playthrough, the strategy will remain the same, so it's not the biggest deal in the world.
What is required is a complex game system that avoids becoming a jigsaw puzzle, and by that, I mean that a game should make sense and not rely on the complexity as the game's sole selling point. Otherwise, the game turns out to be a jigsaw puzzle where you're spending the entire game piecing together the method and order rather than letting the game speak for itself. So, randomization is part of the equation, but there has to be some sense involved. NPC's who have dynamic dialogue can help avert this so that the player can discover things in a sensible fashion within the game world rather than piecing together the game world itself. It's just one example, but I hardly ever see this used in a game. If I go to GameFAQs, I know the exact location of every item, the odds of getting it, the method of getting it, who to take it to and where to find them, and what taking it to that person will do. It just doesn't seem very...satisfying.
Anyway, rant over. Rescuing laundry.
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December 4, 2009
December 3, 2009
Achievement unlocked: Read every page of the history book
I'm still playing Demon's Souls, and it has become a much more impressive beast with each hour I put into it. It just gets better. Yes, I had this the night it came out, but I lapsed quite a bit when about a dozen new games came out that demanded my attention. The time allowed me to reflect and get a fresh perspective on what I could do to survive a little longer, and it has certainly helped. Since I'm not fearing corners anymore, it has given me more time to appreciate the attention From Software gave to their game world, and start to viciously hate some other games out there that avoid this.
Starting with Half-Life 2 as one of the best examples of all time, the concept of the "game world" should be an awful like what is done with movies in that a movie studio doesn't hand out a book with every showing to explain everything that's going on. That's what the two hours are for. It's a studio's job to develop a world and immerse the viewer in it. Blade Runner did not ask that you read the Phillip K. Dick novel, nor did it explain what had put Earth into such decay. Instead, it showed in a few seconds how pollution had accumulated, and some of the most moving passing words in the history if films described the breadth of human colonization. Nowhere did this movie slap speeches or texts to explain things, and left that task to the brilliant visuals that told their own story to fill in any gaps.
Half-Life 2 achieves this beautifully, expecting the player to gain knowledge of the events around them by brief context clues and the interpretation of how the events of humanity came to be. The storyline can, in fact, by summed up briefly by speeches, but 90% of what's going on is left for your senses to complete. It is a world of immersion at heart, and it is a plus for Demon's Souls to carry on with this approach to storytelling. Do either of these games force you on fetch quests or "catch 'em all" achievement lists so that you can understand every piece of the story? Are either of these games pretentious enough to explain more than is necessary?
Failures of storytelling amount to dropping the midi-chlorian bomb in game form. Less explanation, more application.
In a strange twist, I chose Blade Runner for its storytelling strengths when a game largely inspired by it came out in the form of Snatcher. Snatcher is a text game that requires you to investigate nearly everything in the game world, but that world is so freakishly detailed that it even has a database dedicated to educating the player on the past and present of the game world. While it seems as if this would be a complete storytelling failure, it actually works well. Some games can pull it off while others cannot.
It's pretty simple, though. If you're a game devoted to information and brains with a slow pace, then describing more gives a game a novel-like strength. If you're spending most of your time knee-deep in action, than information should be more inferred and shown as creative eye candy rather than taking the pansy route out and dropping pick-ups along the way. While it's true that I had been impressed with the Web of Intrigue within Prototype, it was the introduction of a concept that had me thinking positively, not the way it truly played out.
In games where a lot of visuals are going on, what a developer chooses to show carries more weight than how they usually choose to explain it. Aeris' ghost in the later parts of Final Fantasy VII caused a gigantic wave of interest, while I do not know of any audio log that has garnered any significant attention. Digg It Stumble it ! Reddit
Starting with Half-Life 2 as one of the best examples of all time, the concept of the "game world" should be an awful like what is done with movies in that a movie studio doesn't hand out a book with every showing to explain everything that's going on. That's what the two hours are for. It's a studio's job to develop a world and immerse the viewer in it. Blade Runner did not ask that you read the Phillip K. Dick novel, nor did it explain what had put Earth into such decay. Instead, it showed in a few seconds how pollution had accumulated, and some of the most moving passing words in the history if films described the breadth of human colonization. Nowhere did this movie slap speeches or texts to explain things, and left that task to the brilliant visuals that told their own story to fill in any gaps.
Half-Life 2 achieves this beautifully, expecting the player to gain knowledge of the events around them by brief context clues and the interpretation of how the events of humanity came to be. The storyline can, in fact, by summed up briefly by speeches, but 90% of what's going on is left for your senses to complete. It is a world of immersion at heart, and it is a plus for Demon's Souls to carry on with this approach to storytelling. Do either of these games force you on fetch quests or "catch 'em all" achievement lists so that you can understand every piece of the story? Are either of these games pretentious enough to explain more than is necessary?
Failures of storytelling amount to dropping the midi-chlorian bomb in game form. Less explanation, more application.
In a strange twist, I chose Blade Runner for its storytelling strengths when a game largely inspired by it came out in the form of Snatcher. Snatcher is a text game that requires you to investigate nearly everything in the game world, but that world is so freakishly detailed that it even has a database dedicated to educating the player on the past and present of the game world. While it seems as if this would be a complete storytelling failure, it actually works well. Some games can pull it off while others cannot.
It's pretty simple, though. If you're a game devoted to information and brains with a slow pace, then describing more gives a game a novel-like strength. If you're spending most of your time knee-deep in action, than information should be more inferred and shown as creative eye candy rather than taking the pansy route out and dropping pick-ups along the way. While it's true that I had been impressed with the Web of Intrigue within Prototype, it was the introduction of a concept that had me thinking positively, not the way it truly played out.
In games where a lot of visuals are going on, what a developer chooses to show carries more weight than how they usually choose to explain it. Aeris' ghost in the later parts of Final Fantasy VII caused a gigantic wave of interest, while I do not know of any audio log that has garnered any significant attention. Digg It Stumble it ! Reddit
December 2, 2009
The times, they are a changin'
A year ago, the PS3 was in pretty bad shape. Black Friday had come and gone, and the PS3 got whooped on in the process. Rock Band 360 bundles were flying off shelves, and there was no way that Sony was going to catch up. There were still high hopes, but some people honestly thought that the PS3 had taken a reeling punch that it would never fully recover from. The library was utter crap, games were too expensive, the hardware was too expensive, the system was a monolith, and the company had no real identity.
Thankfully, Sony didn't tap out, and instead pulled itself out of the gutter with a mixture of guts, timing, and pure luck. They cut the price of the console by 25%, worthy bundles started showing up, and whatever loss they were going to take on Black Friday in system sales they were going to make up for with an install base that is still growing by leaps and bounds. There's no easy way to say this, but once the price of the PS3 was within reach of mortals, there is no question that the Xbox was second on the population's mind. Sales figures prove it, and almost everyone I know that was without a system snapped up the PS3 like it was common sense. Even a few Xbox devoted have ceded that the PS3 is sitting pretty right now, and it's only going to get better.
Before you yell "fanboy", I still think that Sony has problems that they need to sort out. They're still the loser, but all the facts point to a wicked comeback, and that's worthy news. Over the past 3 months, they have managed to keep pace with Microsoft. In August, Sony was behind by 6.4 million consoles. Currently, they are about 6.6 million units behind. For a console that had the "loser" tag on it, it's amazing that they kept up. Cleaning house on Black Friday means that the gap will shrink, and the holiday season isn't even over. We'll find out how strong the PlayStation brand name is over the course of the month, but if last weekend was any indication, they could conceivably bring the gap well under 6 million by the time the year is over with.
The new "it only does everything" slogan in blue seems to be working for Sony, effectively ceding one of the most expensive marketing errors their company has ever produced and returning the console to its roots. Right down to the logo and plastic casing, this system is finally reminding people what owning PS2 dominance felt like. The more familiar look is likely to get a few sales back in Sony's corner, and their Sony "family" is finally getting some real use. Even the media marketplace is finally looking really good, and rumors are heavy that the upcoming backwards compatibility should be a free "thank you" to follow through on promises rather than a paid scam.
To think, all of this good news for Sony and their potential sales, and we still haven't even made it to Final Fantasy XIII.
Yet, there I go, mentioning software like Sony had planned this. No, they got really lucky. A year ago, PlayStation owners were wondering just where their titles were. The shelves were barren of anything worth playing exclusive to the black beast. A year later, everything has changed.
Demon's Souls came out of nowhere to pacify the RPG fans who were about to lose their minds over a lack of truly great games for the genre. Sure, Atlus was certainly surprised enough to reprint the game, but Sony sure as hell didn't expect that kind of attention and wound up with a terrific piece of ammunition for the fight.
Then there were the exclusives. Infamous came out and met expectations. Uncharted 2 blew everyone away. The downloadable hit Fat Princess caught attention when the PSN was notorious for having few exclusives. The future looks to be in good shape, too. MAG and God of War III are on the way, and the Last Guardian was looking like a worthy follow up for Team ICO.
Good multiplatform games then started to swarm. Modern Warfare 2. Batman: Arkham Asylum. Bayonetta. Ninja Gaiden 2. Borderlands. Dragon Age. Assassin's Creed 2.
For once, a PS3 owner can feel overwhelmed by the amount of great games out there. It's partially luck that it all happened so fast, but it's also what happens when you put a powerful system out there that no one has truly figured out how to use yet. The PlayStation library is going to get better in a hurry, and we haven't even made it to the point in the current console generation where niche titles start to see the light of day. Atlus hasn't made a major release outside of Demon's Souls, which they only published, so you can count on even better times ahead.
So yeah, they got lucky. They had a lot go right for then in the span of a year that really saved their brand, part of it planned, part of it blind luck, and part of it was also taking that blind luck and running with it. This is Sony we're talking about, so it's entirely possible they may choose to pull off some bonehead move to alienate the populace yet again. For now, PS3 owners can finally smile.
As a final note, to the many Diggers and media boys out there who think that the current generation is on the fade, think with your brains. We aren't even at the halfway point. Both the 360 and the PS3 will peak in the near future, but we haven't even touched on what both consoles are truly capable of. Developers are still learning what they can do with the hardware.Microsoft is sitting pretty with a "stable" piece of hardware with a good lifespan, and they will expand functionality. Sony still wants to make a profit, and their system hasn't even begun to peak. A new system would be a huge flush of cash, partners, publicity, and trust.
Why haven't I mentioned Nintendo? Well, it's obvious that if they really want to stay in the game, they're going to have to go the DSi route and release an updated Wii system, or the "Wii HD" as it has been termed. Third parties familiar with GameCube and Wii experience are already sending games out the door at a blistering pace and would LOVE a boost in power to take advantage of the install base and cheap development costs while seriously competing with the other companies' major titles. Expect Wii Motion Plus to be built in to the Wiimote, better graphical capabilities, 720p, a bigger focus on digital media, and a couple of serious ports (RE5). I'd even go so far to say that they will sneak a camera and a good microphone onto the system and Wiimotes, as well as putting some focus on social media. This would not only give them video chat and an integrated headset, but also evolve their patented motion controls to compete with Natal and the Wand. Expect it.
Thus ends my "state of the big 3" that is customary every other month. Digg It Stumble it ! Reddit
Thankfully, Sony didn't tap out, and instead pulled itself out of the gutter with a mixture of guts, timing, and pure luck. They cut the price of the console by 25%, worthy bundles started showing up, and whatever loss they were going to take on Black Friday in system sales they were going to make up for with an install base that is still growing by leaps and bounds. There's no easy way to say this, but once the price of the PS3 was within reach of mortals, there is no question that the Xbox was second on the population's mind. Sales figures prove it, and almost everyone I know that was without a system snapped up the PS3 like it was common sense. Even a few Xbox devoted have ceded that the PS3 is sitting pretty right now, and it's only going to get better.
Before you yell "fanboy", I still think that Sony has problems that they need to sort out. They're still the loser, but all the facts point to a wicked comeback, and that's worthy news. Over the past 3 months, they have managed to keep pace with Microsoft. In August, Sony was behind by 6.4 million consoles. Currently, they are about 6.6 million units behind. For a console that had the "loser" tag on it, it's amazing that they kept up. Cleaning house on Black Friday means that the gap will shrink, and the holiday season isn't even over. We'll find out how strong the PlayStation brand name is over the course of the month, but if last weekend was any indication, they could conceivably bring the gap well under 6 million by the time the year is over with.
The new "it only does everything" slogan in blue seems to be working for Sony, effectively ceding one of the most expensive marketing errors their company has ever produced and returning the console to its roots. Right down to the logo and plastic casing, this system is finally reminding people what owning PS2 dominance felt like. The more familiar look is likely to get a few sales back in Sony's corner, and their Sony "family" is finally getting some real use. Even the media marketplace is finally looking really good, and rumors are heavy that the upcoming backwards compatibility should be a free "thank you" to follow through on promises rather than a paid scam.
To think, all of this good news for Sony and their potential sales, and we still haven't even made it to Final Fantasy XIII.
Yet, there I go, mentioning software like Sony had planned this. No, they got really lucky. A year ago, PlayStation owners were wondering just where their titles were. The shelves were barren of anything worth playing exclusive to the black beast. A year later, everything has changed.
Demon's Souls came out of nowhere to pacify the RPG fans who were about to lose their minds over a lack of truly great games for the genre. Sure, Atlus was certainly surprised enough to reprint the game, but Sony sure as hell didn't expect that kind of attention and wound up with a terrific piece of ammunition for the fight.
Then there were the exclusives. Infamous came out and met expectations. Uncharted 2 blew everyone away. The downloadable hit Fat Princess caught attention when the PSN was notorious for having few exclusives. The future looks to be in good shape, too. MAG and God of War III are on the way, and the Last Guardian was looking like a worthy follow up for Team ICO.
Good multiplatform games then started to swarm. Modern Warfare 2. Batman: Arkham Asylum. Bayonetta. Ninja Gaiden 2. Borderlands. Dragon Age. Assassin's Creed 2.
For once, a PS3 owner can feel overwhelmed by the amount of great games out there. It's partially luck that it all happened so fast, but it's also what happens when you put a powerful system out there that no one has truly figured out how to use yet. The PlayStation library is going to get better in a hurry, and we haven't even made it to the point in the current console generation where niche titles start to see the light of day. Atlus hasn't made a major release outside of Demon's Souls, which they only published, so you can count on even better times ahead.
So yeah, they got lucky. They had a lot go right for then in the span of a year that really saved their brand, part of it planned, part of it blind luck, and part of it was also taking that blind luck and running with it. This is Sony we're talking about, so it's entirely possible they may choose to pull off some bonehead move to alienate the populace yet again. For now, PS3 owners can finally smile.
As a final note, to the many Diggers and media boys out there who think that the current generation is on the fade, think with your brains. We aren't even at the halfway point. Both the 360 and the PS3 will peak in the near future, but we haven't even touched on what both consoles are truly capable of. Developers are still learning what they can do with the hardware.Microsoft is sitting pretty with a "stable" piece of hardware with a good lifespan, and they will expand functionality. Sony still wants to make a profit, and their system hasn't even begun to peak. A new system would be a huge flush of cash, partners, publicity, and trust.
Why haven't I mentioned Nintendo? Well, it's obvious that if they really want to stay in the game, they're going to have to go the DSi route and release an updated Wii system, or the "Wii HD" as it has been termed. Third parties familiar with GameCube and Wii experience are already sending games out the door at a blistering pace and would LOVE a boost in power to take advantage of the install base and cheap development costs while seriously competing with the other companies' major titles. Expect Wii Motion Plus to be built in to the Wiimote, better graphical capabilities, 720p, a bigger focus on digital media, and a couple of serious ports (RE5). I'd even go so far to say that they will sneak a camera and a good microphone onto the system and Wiimotes, as well as putting some focus on social media. This would not only give them video chat and an integrated headset, but also evolve their patented motion controls to compete with Natal and the Wand. Expect it.
Thus ends my "state of the big 3" that is customary every other month. Digg It Stumble it ! Reddit
December 1, 2009
As if enough non-related ranting had already happened...
If you've been paying attention to the world of sports this week, you'll notice that Tiger Woods has finally made headlines for something other than his golfing exploits. The dependably clean cut star found himself in a car crash, and he'd rather not talk about it. Police have tried to get a warrant to further investigate the matter, believing the circumstances to be a little more than an "oops" on Tiger Woods' part. As of posting this, police have cited him for careless driving and nothing more.
Since news of the crash came to the media's attention, Tiger has maintained that the matter is private and that he will remain silent to everyone including the police. However, this story has since exploded to epic scandal proportions. Was he on drugs? Was he having an affair? Was there domestic abuse? The facts don't match up the way I like them, something is afoot!
Well, tough.
I'm not a Tiger follower because I'm not a golf guy, so maybe I don't understand where the obsession is coming from to turn him into an evil character overnight. Why everyone is demanding information on this is beyond me, because no one has the right or reason to do so. Even looking at the reports, I don't see why anyone thinks something has to be going on in the background. He got into a car accident and some things happened that seemed weird, but in the end, it was a car accident. You are specifically told by anyone who knows anything about car accidents to divulge only the facts that are necessary when describing the incident. You don't say what you think, you don't say what you feel, and you certainly don't tell people anything more than they need to know.
Seeing as how I have heard this story told second hand a few times now, it sounds like Tiger was mad at something, so he got in his car and tried to cool off, only he was flustered enough to make a mistake and hit something that wrecked him. Have you ever been flustered behind the wheel of a car? If you get pulled over and questioned by your insurance and the cops, do you really think it's a good idea to describe in detail that you were pissed off at something, what that something was, and that you were guilty of something other than a second of bad driving? Of course you don't. You're nuts if you do.
What happened with Tiger happens with people you know all the time, and we tell those people to do the exact same thing Tiger is doing now. Shut up, only tell them the facts, pay the fine, and be happy it wasn't more serious than it was.
If you're still not convinced, go find a guy at your workplace that just got into a car accident. Proceed to tell him that you know the truth, and that he was really just hopped up on painkillers before he got in the car to go sleep with a downtown hooker. See where that gets you.
When your spouse won't stop asking where you got the black eye from, I'm pretty sure it'll just be a misunderstanding that you don't want to talk about.
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I hate America, and you do too
With a title like that, you'd think I'd start spouting verses from some cult pamphlet.
Searching through the mountain of crap that is Facebook just to find out if a friend dropped a message about the Saints/Patriots game, I discovered how much less I like the service when every other friend seemed to have an opinion about God or America that was pretty narrow in scope. Having a belief is not a bad thing, but as I've said before, things are getting to the point where insanity is a gentle way of describing the way humanity has become.
The reason is that all of these beliefs are becoming antiquated, or at least they should be. When I was a child, I believed that the American way of life was the only way to go. Even now, I don't see anything particularly wrong with the hope that if one works hard, one can succeed and reach their desired goals. Our rights should be protected, because we are human beings, but the entire concept of this has gone out the window. "Real American" is a term that actually fights against what we're supposed to believe in. If the "American Way" and our unofficial Christian religion actually had anything to say, then each individual American wouldn't spend their time defending how it is their God-given right to use others as a pedestal. Seriously, listen to these people who get up on their podiums and say, almost exactly, these phrases:
"If the government gets any more control, I will no longer be able to field a company of fat CEO's, and that is un-American."
"You are a traitor if you believe that caring for the well-being of others is a priority of the country."
"It's OK to take liberties away from people, as long as its not me. That would be Socialism/Communism."
"It's OK to cheat people our of their money. Asking me to spare a few bucks from my multi-million dollar bank account to make sure someone doesn't die from a cold is not OK."
"Our President showed respect for another world leader? Well, he must be an evil socialist, because a true american capitalist would have pissed on his shoes."
I could go on for hours, but I don't care who you are, you simply cannot argue that these things have been said. We're not Americans. We're elitist pricks who care nothing of others, so long as they aren't bombing us.
You can save your hate mail for another few minutes, though, because Americans aren't the only problem. Rather, the country is just making obvious what the real problems are, and sometimes it's even nice to be part of a country that is at least willing to tell some nutcase that no, he can't have a mass murder device to play with.
It's people, in general, that are the problem, and it is a problem that I've been dwelling on for years. It hit me like a ton of bricks and has been raking at my brain ever since I read an article about how we haven't found intelligent life "out there" yet. This has everything and nothing to do with alien life. The ideal behind the article is one that has been debated ever since we've seriously considered first contact a real possibility. If there's intelligent life out there, how come they haven't contacted us? Are they smart enough to stay away? Are we egotistical to think that our green time bomb is worth the trouble to a species capable of interstellar travel? Maybe there's nothing out there. Maybe it's already extinct. Maybe we're lucky.
Or, maybe, as the article pointed out, the entire idea of "civilization" is a counter-productive word in itself. Maybe having the brains to create a civilization and the ego to shape it is ultimately what prohibits us from advancing to the point of being star-tourists. When the time comes, are we really going to be able to save ourselves from anything? At this point, no.
People think that communism is evil, but that wasn't always the idea. On paper, communism was the perfect idea that needed a little tweaking, but communism has never existed as it was meant to. Communism is meant to be something along the lines of a zombie survival clan. The team is led by the best brain or two, the guns go to the best shooters, the rest gather resources, and the food and shelter is shared. If someone is cut loose, it's for the greater good and not for greed. Even that doesn't ever play out well, so you can see why communism never worked. People have needs and desires, and these needs and desires will clash. If everything is shared, someone will want more. Communism was always corrupt this way.
Capitalism, on the other hand, is a bunch of people who don't know when enough is enough. There is a girl I know that is the epitome of capitalism. She has never worked hard in her life and has always had everything handed to her on a silver platter. She has never earned anything, but rather, gets on the good side of those who would give it to her for free. She honestly believes that if it came down to it, she deserves health care more than your un-insured mother. Why? Well, despite her supposed belief in sharing, it is also her belief that despite the fact that her name has never been the primary recipient of health care, it is being shared with her in a capitalistic fashion, so that makes it OK. It bothers her that the government would allow someone to have health insurance that didn't work for it, even though the main priorities of her day are makeup and playing with her iPhone, none of which she bought. Though, I do suppose that this description would classify her as a pet more than anything, so maybe my argument is moot.
In reality, it all comes down to what mankind is capable of if we would just drop these labels. It's sad, but if a republican, a democrat, a communist, and a socialist were driving in a limo with a trunk full of food through the Sahara Desert and they came across a starving toddler....do you really think that there would be any argument as to what happens next? This is what we are capable of. If we took all of the food that this country wasted in the span of a week and tallied it up, we would find that world hunger is quite possibly the easiest thing in the world to solve, but we just refuse to do it. If the top ten most profitable companies in the world decided that they would take half of their yearly profits and were to fund new schools with them instead, then we would make a significant leap forward in our planet's overall education. We won't, and sometimes we can't because of other ego problems. Let's face it, if you start dumping several million dollars of goods in front of a country that hasn't stabilized itself yet, then someone is going to demand control over that for some stupid reason.
Then, there's religion. Please, somebody, ANYBODY, write me and tell me a religious doctrine that includes the decimation of non-believers. I actually don't know the answer to that. It would seem like religions mostly say, "live a good life in this way, live by these rules, and you will be rewarded."
Since when has humanity ever obeyed by those rules? In the average day, and American knowingly breaks at least one religious rule that they claim to believe in. Just owning a TV is grounds for getting thrown into Hell if you pay attention. Religion ultimately makes us go at each other's throats more than anything else when it comes to the grand scheme of things. You'd think that it was the US Armed Forces vs. terrorists, but some people have even spun that into an Americans vs. Muslim cage fight.
And we make weapons. Lots of weapons. We call it defense, but we really just perfect the art of killing. We can do it clean, quietly, and make sure no one ever knew it happened, or we can create the biggest bang in the history of bombs. It all comes down to style and the message you're trying to get across. They don't call it the "business end" without reason.
One day, none if it will matter. A black hole, supernova, meteor, alien death fortress, grey goo, polar shift.....none of those will discriminate. It won't matter what color you are, what race you are, what religion you are, what country you're from, what clothes you wear, what car you drive, etc. It's just going to kill you and bring some peace and quiet to the solar system. Funny thing is, we're entirely capable of handling all of that.
Most likely, we'll kill ourselves off first. Here we are, arguing about global warming, and the entire argument is the most worthless argument ever seriously debated in the planet's history. We're pumping tons of toxins into the air every minute of the day, and nobody in their right minds can honestly say that is a good thing regardless of whether or not it's causing the warming or not. If the world is cooling or warming, shouldn't we also stop arguing about who started it and maybe, you know, use our powerful human brains to decide what we're going to do when it ultimately happens? We're screwed. We're never going to get off this rock. We could, but we don't want to. We're incapable.
Watch Star Trek IV. Kirk winds up in the 80's with the crew of the Enterprise in an effort to save the future Earth because of the destructive sins of its past. In particular, humpback whales went extinct due to excessive and needless hunting practices. Yet, even though this point is pummeled through your brain like a jackhammer, it's something else in the movie that makes even more sense. Kirk gives away a few bills to each crew member, saying that the people of 80's Earth still use currency.
With all of the clamor made about having to start using Chinese currency or joining the EU, think about how things would be if we ditched money altogether. If we actually put ourselves to the test and did what humanity was capable of, we wouldn't need the stuff. It's really up to you to think about the different flavors of good that could be.
You may argue that you are absolutely against a world government. That's fair, but it makes no sense if the government was a good one. You may argue that religions would die out, but I don't see why they would have to. No one ever said that in order to succeed as a race, we had to block out the eastern sun or bulldoze a temple. You may also argue that capitalism would die, but why is that a big problem? You mean to honestly tell me that the value of a person's music or the ability to write "yes" on a sheet of paper makes them worth more than the person who works hard to make sure that their buildings are safe to sit in? I, for one, can't make that judgement. No one can. If music was free, would we have pirates? If we didn't have pirates, would we get spied on as much? If a person had all the resources in the world at their disposal to improve themselves, then how many frustrated people would we lose in this world that potentially could have caused the rest of us harm?
Sure, it sounds like utopia, but we are a species, and we're supposed to be surviving. We're not doing a very good job of it. Surviving means eventually getting off this rock, because it's going to go away eventually. Utopia on Earth would not mean that our species would lack a goal or challenge to push us forward and retain our humanity. We'd find trouble elsewhere, and we'd always have a little chaos on the homefront, but at least our species would have finally done what our parents always told us to do; go out there and be somebody.
Which is funnier when you consider that every politician and pundit whines and cries (see Beck, Glenn) about how their parents don't know anything. Digg It Stumble it ! Reddit
Searching through the mountain of crap that is Facebook just to find out if a friend dropped a message about the Saints/Patriots game, I discovered how much less I like the service when every other friend seemed to have an opinion about God or America that was pretty narrow in scope. Having a belief is not a bad thing, but as I've said before, things are getting to the point where insanity is a gentle way of describing the way humanity has become.
The reason is that all of these beliefs are becoming antiquated, or at least they should be. When I was a child, I believed that the American way of life was the only way to go. Even now, I don't see anything particularly wrong with the hope that if one works hard, one can succeed and reach their desired goals. Our rights should be protected, because we are human beings, but the entire concept of this has gone out the window. "Real American" is a term that actually fights against what we're supposed to believe in. If the "American Way" and our unofficial Christian religion actually had anything to say, then each individual American wouldn't spend their time defending how it is their God-given right to use others as a pedestal. Seriously, listen to these people who get up on their podiums and say, almost exactly, these phrases:
"If the government gets any more control, I will no longer be able to field a company of fat CEO's, and that is un-American."
"You are a traitor if you believe that caring for the well-being of others is a priority of the country."
"It's OK to take liberties away from people, as long as its not me. That would be Socialism/Communism."
"It's OK to cheat people our of their money. Asking me to spare a few bucks from my multi-million dollar bank account to make sure someone doesn't die from a cold is not OK."
"Our President showed respect for another world leader? Well, he must be an evil socialist, because a true american capitalist would have pissed on his shoes."
I could go on for hours, but I don't care who you are, you simply cannot argue that these things have been said. We're not Americans. We're elitist pricks who care nothing of others, so long as they aren't bombing us.
You can save your hate mail for another few minutes, though, because Americans aren't the only problem. Rather, the country is just making obvious what the real problems are, and sometimes it's even nice to be part of a country that is at least willing to tell some nutcase that no, he can't have a mass murder device to play with.
It's people, in general, that are the problem, and it is a problem that I've been dwelling on for years. It hit me like a ton of bricks and has been raking at my brain ever since I read an article about how we haven't found intelligent life "out there" yet. This has everything and nothing to do with alien life. The ideal behind the article is one that has been debated ever since we've seriously considered first contact a real possibility. If there's intelligent life out there, how come they haven't contacted us? Are they smart enough to stay away? Are we egotistical to think that our green time bomb is worth the trouble to a species capable of interstellar travel? Maybe there's nothing out there. Maybe it's already extinct. Maybe we're lucky.
Or, maybe, as the article pointed out, the entire idea of "civilization" is a counter-productive word in itself. Maybe having the brains to create a civilization and the ego to shape it is ultimately what prohibits us from advancing to the point of being star-tourists. When the time comes, are we really going to be able to save ourselves from anything? At this point, no.
People think that communism is evil, but that wasn't always the idea. On paper, communism was the perfect idea that needed a little tweaking, but communism has never existed as it was meant to. Communism is meant to be something along the lines of a zombie survival clan. The team is led by the best brain or two, the guns go to the best shooters, the rest gather resources, and the food and shelter is shared. If someone is cut loose, it's for the greater good and not for greed. Even that doesn't ever play out well, so you can see why communism never worked. People have needs and desires, and these needs and desires will clash. If everything is shared, someone will want more. Communism was always corrupt this way.
Capitalism, on the other hand, is a bunch of people who don't know when enough is enough. There is a girl I know that is the epitome of capitalism. She has never worked hard in her life and has always had everything handed to her on a silver platter. She has never earned anything, but rather, gets on the good side of those who would give it to her for free. She honestly believes that if it came down to it, she deserves health care more than your un-insured mother. Why? Well, despite her supposed belief in sharing, it is also her belief that despite the fact that her name has never been the primary recipient of health care, it is being shared with her in a capitalistic fashion, so that makes it OK. It bothers her that the government would allow someone to have health insurance that didn't work for it, even though the main priorities of her day are makeup and playing with her iPhone, none of which she bought. Though, I do suppose that this description would classify her as a pet more than anything, so maybe my argument is moot.
In reality, it all comes down to what mankind is capable of if we would just drop these labels. It's sad, but if a republican, a democrat, a communist, and a socialist were driving in a limo with a trunk full of food through the Sahara Desert and they came across a starving toddler....do you really think that there would be any argument as to what happens next? This is what we are capable of. If we took all of the food that this country wasted in the span of a week and tallied it up, we would find that world hunger is quite possibly the easiest thing in the world to solve, but we just refuse to do it. If the top ten most profitable companies in the world decided that they would take half of their yearly profits and were to fund new schools with them instead, then we would make a significant leap forward in our planet's overall education. We won't, and sometimes we can't because of other ego problems. Let's face it, if you start dumping several million dollars of goods in front of a country that hasn't stabilized itself yet, then someone is going to demand control over that for some stupid reason.
Then, there's religion. Please, somebody, ANYBODY, write me and tell me a religious doctrine that includes the decimation of non-believers. I actually don't know the answer to that. It would seem like religions mostly say, "live a good life in this way, live by these rules, and you will be rewarded."
Since when has humanity ever obeyed by those rules? In the average day, and American knowingly breaks at least one religious rule that they claim to believe in. Just owning a TV is grounds for getting thrown into Hell if you pay attention. Religion ultimately makes us go at each other's throats more than anything else when it comes to the grand scheme of things. You'd think that it was the US Armed Forces vs. terrorists, but some people have even spun that into an Americans vs. Muslim cage fight.
And we make weapons. Lots of weapons. We call it defense, but we really just perfect the art of killing. We can do it clean, quietly, and make sure no one ever knew it happened, or we can create the biggest bang in the history of bombs. It all comes down to style and the message you're trying to get across. They don't call it the "business end" without reason.
One day, none if it will matter. A black hole, supernova, meteor, alien death fortress, grey goo, polar shift.....none of those will discriminate. It won't matter what color you are, what race you are, what religion you are, what country you're from, what clothes you wear, what car you drive, etc. It's just going to kill you and bring some peace and quiet to the solar system. Funny thing is, we're entirely capable of handling all of that.
Most likely, we'll kill ourselves off first. Here we are, arguing about global warming, and the entire argument is the most worthless argument ever seriously debated in the planet's history. We're pumping tons of toxins into the air every minute of the day, and nobody in their right minds can honestly say that is a good thing regardless of whether or not it's causing the warming or not. If the world is cooling or warming, shouldn't we also stop arguing about who started it and maybe, you know, use our powerful human brains to decide what we're going to do when it ultimately happens? We're screwed. We're never going to get off this rock. We could, but we don't want to. We're incapable.
Watch Star Trek IV. Kirk winds up in the 80's with the crew of the Enterprise in an effort to save the future Earth because of the destructive sins of its past. In particular, humpback whales went extinct due to excessive and needless hunting practices. Yet, even though this point is pummeled through your brain like a jackhammer, it's something else in the movie that makes even more sense. Kirk gives away a few bills to each crew member, saying that the people of 80's Earth still use currency.
With all of the clamor made about having to start using Chinese currency or joining the EU, think about how things would be if we ditched money altogether. If we actually put ourselves to the test and did what humanity was capable of, we wouldn't need the stuff. It's really up to you to think about the different flavors of good that could be.
You may argue that you are absolutely against a world government. That's fair, but it makes no sense if the government was a good one. You may argue that religions would die out, but I don't see why they would have to. No one ever said that in order to succeed as a race, we had to block out the eastern sun or bulldoze a temple. You may also argue that capitalism would die, but why is that a big problem? You mean to honestly tell me that the value of a person's music or the ability to write "yes" on a sheet of paper makes them worth more than the person who works hard to make sure that their buildings are safe to sit in? I, for one, can't make that judgement. No one can. If music was free, would we have pirates? If we didn't have pirates, would we get spied on as much? If a person had all the resources in the world at their disposal to improve themselves, then how many frustrated people would we lose in this world that potentially could have caused the rest of us harm?
Sure, it sounds like utopia, but we are a species, and we're supposed to be surviving. We're not doing a very good job of it. Surviving means eventually getting off this rock, because it's going to go away eventually. Utopia on Earth would not mean that our species would lack a goal or challenge to push us forward and retain our humanity. We'd find trouble elsewhere, and we'd always have a little chaos on the homefront, but at least our species would have finally done what our parents always told us to do; go out there and be somebody.
Which is funnier when you consider that every politician and pundit whines and cries (see Beck, Glenn) about how their parents don't know anything. Digg It Stumble it ! Reddit
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