Going the Extra Meter

My first fighting games were all 3d, and they followed the traditional rules of 3d fighters: no hit-pauses, no crouching blocks against mids, and no super meters. I didn't give supers a second thought-- I figured they were just another move, which meant little considering 3d fighters had easily 10 to 20 times the move set as their 2d brethren.

After a year of analyzing competitive fighting games at a high level, I am now of the opinion that the super meter is the single most ingenious, elegant addition to the genre since character variety.

First of all, super moves not only add to a player's arsenal, but affect all the non-super moves and abilities as well. Let's consider the Ryu vs Blanka matchup in Street Fighter 4:

No-meter Ryu vs. No-meter Blanka

• Ryu's fireball is SAFE against Blanka outside slide range
• Ryu's uppercut very UNSAFE against blocking Blanka
• Blanka's horizontal ball is SAFE against blocking Ryu

Half-meter Ryu vs Half-meter Blanka

• Ryu's fireball now UNSAFE against charged Blanka (threat of EX-Ball)
  
• Ryu's uppercut now SAFE against blocking Blanka (via FADC)
  
• Blanka's horizontal ball still SAFE

Full-meter Ryu vs Full-meter Blanka

• Ryu's fireball still UNSAFE against charged Blanka
• Ryu's uppercut still SAFE against blocking Blanka
• Blanka's horizontal ball now UNSAFE to blocking Ryu (punishable with Super)
  

The addition of the super meter in Street Fighter 4 dynamically changes the relationships of the existing moves, creating an ebb and flow of the match as these meters are built and burned. Compare this to a traditional 3d fighter, in which every move has the same level of safety (i.e. risk) regardless of who has the upper hand in the match, or how long the match has run.

Meter changes the dynamic of the match enough that it presents a new metagame: to be in control of the super meters is to be in control of the match. This presents meaningful choices to be made other than the basic objective of "Deplete the opponent's vitality," presenting far more options to the player in a given situation.

On Offense:

• Sacrifice combo damage to save meter?
• Sacrifice offensive pressure to bait meter usage from opponent?
  

On Defense:

• Sacrifice ability to block to whiff moves and build meter?
• Sacrifice meter (i.e. offensive capability) to avoid damage?
  

Other:

• Use meter to recover from mistakes?
• Intentionally allow opponent to win a round by using meter in order to have meter advantage the following round?
  

Through this metagame, super meters create a context around every decision made during the match. Obviously, a player's available options in a given situation are limited by how much meter he has, but the real beauty of this design is that his available options next time he is forced to make a choice are affected by his original decision.

Compare this to a 3d fighting game, where the player has every option available to him at all times. In a 2d fighter, the options available to a player change considering what he had done earlier in the round, and what he plans to do later on. Rather than a string of unrelated puzzles, a fight that involves meter must be thought of as different parts of the same story, complete with the arc of a beginning, middle, and end (translating here to "learn opponent, anticipate opponent, and kill opponent"). Giving "guess" situations this level of context is exactly what makes high level play meaningful.

At the end of the day, modern fighting games really are just fast-paced games of rock/paper/scissors. The role of super meters is to redefine what rock, paper, and scissors all mean within the context of the match, in addition to giving more meaning to the guessing game itself.

The Genius of the Barrel Roll

It's no surprise that Afterburner Climax features a barrel roll. Sega has lived its entire life in Nintendo's shadow, and even though Afterburner easily predates Starfox, everyone that looks at a plane-based rail shooter is going to suggest that the player hit Z or R twice.

Like any younger brother with a minority complex, Sega tries to do all the same things as Nintendo, but faster and cooler and more awesome. With Afterburner Climax's buttery smooth gameplay and killer graphics, Sega was halfway there-- but how would they possibly improve upon the one-liner that burned Arwings into our entire generation's subconscious?

Let me count the ways:

1. Vantage Point

The player camera rolls along with the player, spinning the entire world upside down for a moment. This is initially extremely disorienting for the player and really works to drive the point home that barrel rolls are a big deal. No one is going to just be chaining roll after roll together idly to stay invulnerable like in Starfox-- barrel rolls are a maneuver to be respected.

This also takes advantage of the extraordinary visuals in the game.

1. Control

Instead of a dedicated roll control, Afterburner Climax uses a strange way to trigger the barrel roll: while fully banked in one direction, roll in the other. This creates a much more analog feel to the flight control, giving new players something interesting to learn rather than another button to memorize.

The first time a player plays this game, he will accidentally trigger a barrel roll. Marrying the control of the aiming with the control of defensive maneuvers in such a way is genius, as the player will learn to carefully decide between offensively and defensively moving the plane.

2. Longevity

With new players, there is no need to teach them an additional control for defense. They'll accidentally trigger the control and then freak out in delight when the world around them spins in a circle. Totally awesome!

As they get better at the game, they will begin to notice that their ability to aim is restricted in some way because certain stick motions will induce an uncontrollable roll. They will begin to nto push the control stick to the outer extreme, introducing a layer of gentle finesse so rare in a blazing fast game like this.

Eventually, the most awesome players will start going after medals like killing X number of enemy aircraft while rolling, creating a new metagame of high risk, high reward gameplay reserved only for masters of the game.

Do a barrel roll! (Press Z or R twice!)

Slippy

The Mastermind

Every year or so I like to look over this again, and I'm shocked to see how true it is every damned time. Lime for truth, salmon for lies:

To outsiders, INTJs may appear to project an aura of "definiteness", of self-confidence. This self-confidence, sometimes mistaken for simple arrogance by the less decisive, is actually of a very specific rather than a general nature; its source lies in the specialized knowledge systems that most INTJs start building at an early age. When it comes to their own areas of expertise -- and INTJs can have several -- they will be able to tell you almost immediately whether or not they can help you, and if so, how. INTJs know what they know, and perhaps still more importantly, they know what they don't know.

INTJs are perfectionists, with a seemingly endless capacity for improving upon anything that takes their interest. What prevents them from becoming chronically bogged down in this pursuit of perfection is the pragmatism so characteristic of the type: INTJs apply (often ruthlessly) the criterion "Does it work?" to everything from their own research efforts to the prevailing social norms. This in turn produces an unusual independence of mind, freeing the INTJ from the constraints of authority, convention, or sentiment for its own sake.

INTJs are known as the "Systems Builders" of the types, perhaps in part because they possess the unusual trait combination of imagination and reliability. Whatever system an INTJ happens to be working on is for them the equivalent of a moral cause to an INFJ; both perfectionism and disregard for authority may come into play, as INTJs can be unsparing of both themselves and the others on the project. Anyone considered to be "slacking," including superiors, will lose their respect -- and will generally be made aware of this; INTJs have also been known to take it upon themselves to implement critical decisions without consulting their supervisors or co-workers. On the other hand, they do tend to be scrupulous and even-handed about recognizing the individual contributions that have gone into a project, and have a gift for seizing opportunities which others might not even notice.

In the broadest terms, what INTJs "do" tends to be what they "know". Typical INTJ career choices are in the sciences and engineering, but they can be found wherever a combination of intellect and incisiveness are required (e.g., law, some areas of academia). INTJs can rise to management positions when they are willing to invest time in marketing their abilities as well as enhancing them, and (whether for the sake of ambition or the desire for privacy) many also find it useful to learn to simulate some degree of surface conformism in order to mask their inherent unconventionality.

Personal relationships, particularly romantic ones, can be the INTJ's Achilles heel. While they are capable of caring deeply for others (usually a select few), and are willing to spend a great deal of time and effort on a relationship, the knowledge and self-confidence that make them so successful in other areas can suddenly abandon or mislead them in interpersonal situations.

This happens in part because many INTJs do not readily grasp the social rituals; for instance, they tend to have little patience and less understanding of such things as small talk and flirtation (which most types consider half the fun of a relationship). To complicate matters, INTJs are usually extremely private people, and can often be naturally impassive as well, which makes them easy to misread and misunderstand. Perhaps the most fundamental problem, however, is that INTJs really want people to make sense. :-) This sometimes results in a peculiar naivete', paralleling that of many Fs -- only instead of expecting inexhaustible affection and empathy from a romantic relationship, the INTJ will expect inexhaustible reasonability and directness.

Probably the strongest INTJ assets in the interpersonal area are their intuitive abilities and their willingness to "work at" a relationship. Although as Ts they do not always have the kind of natural empathy that many Fs do, the Intuitive function can often act as a good substitute by synthesizing the probable meanings behind such things as tone of voice, turn of phrase, and facial expression. This ability can then be honed and directed by consistent, repeated efforts to understand and support those they care about, and those relationships which ultimately do become established with an INTJ tend to be characterized by their robustness, stability, and good communications.

typelogic.com

Many people say to "just be yourself," but I'm a firm believer that I am in charge of who "yourself" is. Continued existence is continual change-- so might as well take control over it, right? I refuse to resign the content of my character to a set of generalities written about an entire group of the human process.

The delicious irony is that the INTJ archetype describes my attitude perfectly.

If I Were In Charge of SSF4

Note: After discussing some of these points with Seth, he informed me of the pull and push process of getting changes into the game. You can't have everything!

Game System:

• Different animations and effects for chip death and for focus death (not enough remaining health to focus) for more immediate feedback of "why did I just die?" and less confusion.
• Alternate "Reversal" message given for wakeup focus attacks and reversal backdashes to encourage players to learning more advanced tactics such as backdash punishing OS's.
• Reversals don't need to break focus. I've tried to focus a couple too many reversal upballs and headbutts... it's a very strange rule seemingly to created to discourage charging focus as okizeme, which is a bad idea already for plenty of other reasons.

Frontend:

• Change the button configuration screen to something that doesn't take 10 years, and also to something that Japanese players can come to America and understand.
• Allow for choosing of character and color BEFORE a match is set up in Championship mode a la VF-- it's blind pick anyway, right? Cut down on the few times of accidental Abel / Ryu selection because of one too many mashed A inputs. Of course, Ultra selection is offered after the matchup is revealed.
• More context-sensitive playback of rival music, instead of ALWAYS playing P2 characters' music every time:
• In Versus, play after one player has a win streak of 5 at least
• In Championship Mode, play during championship match (each player hears his opponents' music)

Chun Li:

Medium kicks-- Currently, back+MK is the target combo starter, neutral MK is the AA, and toward+MK is the stepkick. Any change to this would really be great:

• If the TC kick and the stepkick were switched, Chun would be able to move forward while maintaining back charge.
• If the TC kick and the AA were switched, Chun would be able to AA long-range Rufus dives and immediately pressure with fireballs while he's resetting.

Stomp kicks-- Currently, only down+MK activates stomps, whereas d/b+ or d/f+MK does not. This is to allow Chun players to jump in from range with the very long-reaching j.mk while maintaining both down and backcharge. However, this is sort of a pain in the butt.

• If stomps were were activated with both down+ and d/f+MK, they'd be much more reliable for use in combos while j.mk would still be usable while maintaining charge with d/b.

Jus' sayin'.

Jacket Juice

So thanks to the one whole US Dollar discount, I decided to take a risk and hit up Jamba Juice's new Five Fruit Frenzy smoothie. At the time of this writing, I am halfway finished with the Original (20 oz) smoothie.

"Five Fruit Frenzy" is an absolutely perfect name for this product. The initial taste is nearly overwhelming-- the loudest note here is "tart", but there is more than enough sweet to smooth the experience over for those that don't want to pucker up after every sip. There is so much going on that it could be a little confusing, and the sip is down the hatch before every element can be thoroughly enjoyed, inviting the user to try to brave the frenzy of flavor once again.

The textures of this smoothie are as varied as the flavors. Presumably by using whole fruit rather than juice, the Jamba engineers behind the FFF preserve more than just the flavor-- including strawberry seeds and sweetness-soaked, smashed bits of banana. Once again, there is plenty going on here, perhaps too much for the less adventurous type.

Personally, my go-to selection at Jamyba is the classic Banana Berry, since I like my smoothies like I like my women: predictable, easy to handle, and with consistent level of resistance. But for those of you that like the taste of flavors that bite back, the Five Fruit Frenzy is just like Fierce Feint Fierce-- absolutely stunning.

How to Push My Buttons

Although everyone seems to dismiss it as an archaic way to interface with a game, the act of pushing a button can really be explored to create satisfying play.

A digital (read: not analog) button has 2 states: on and off. Most every game only considers the act of toggling the button from its off state to its on state (referred to as the Positive Edge of input), but some (usually Japanese) games put a strong emphasis on the lifting of the button as well (the Negative Edge).

In Bayonetta in particular, every attack in the game is separated into two halves: an attack on the way out, and on the way in. These halves are assigned to the Positive Edge and Negative Edge respectively-- if a player so chooses, he can leave his attack "out" longer to deal extra damage, at the risk of spending more time vulnerable to a hit from behind. Through this mechanic, a single press of a digital button has an analog level of risk and reward associated with it, adjustable given the player's style and situation in-game.

The result is that each button press becomes two decisions the player is faced with: When should I press this button, and when shall I release it? Pushing a button is the simplest way to interface with a game, but it can packed full of context and tough decisions!

This solution creates a level of customization in every action the player takes, while maintaining the instant, fluid response granted from a one-dimensional input interface. The simultaneous pursuit of creativity and responsiveness has always been core to the Japanese genre of "Stylish Action Game", and is one of my favorite play mechanics in all video games.

Under Pressure

So it turns out that according to my latest reading, my blood pressure is once again riding the line between Prehypertension and Stage 1 Hypertension (the border is at 140/90). Dang.

I've been aware of this problem for some time-- starting from when my PE teacher had me take the reading 10 times in a row in disbelief, to the time I recognized the numbers on my grandmother's BP reading from her hospital bed during a diabetic emergency.

Two summers ago, I was able to get my numbers down to almost normal levels after my ridiculous regime of tennis, lifting, and HIIT-- a feat I'll probably never be able to achieve again. The only way to come close would be to remove as much sodium as possible from my diet, which is worth considering.

Turns out the UK classifies BP up to 140/90 as completely normal, whereas in the US, that's the line between prettycrap and megabad. Why is it then that the US is the one with the disgustingly disproportionate obesity issue and the long-running streak heart-related deaths year after year?

I'm not satisfied until every vein is forced up against my skin. Look how vascular I am, Brian. If there's one thing women love it's a vascular man. I've got veins. They carry my blood all over my bah-dy. That's how John Mayer would say it: "Bah-dy." I'm really into him now. You better be okay with it!

Stewie Griffin

Love and Street Fighter

I hate the art of fighting, but I wanna be the king of fighters!

Dan Hibiki

Lots of people ask me why I play as Chun-Li.

I don't like getting too close to someone. I mean, I'm not bad in that situation; it's just so risky. But I hate being distanced also-- those who prefer that situation are frightening to me. I need to be in some vague middle ground to feel comfortable.

My timing and spacing are okay-- reactions are my weakest link. But to maintain my fragile middle range, I have to be able to step forward if they step back, and step back if they step forward. I have to be react faster than normal against aggression, and be able to seize my few opportunities as they come. But too often I'm simply holding onto my charge instead of pressing forward when the time is right.

The unfortunate fact is that I play with a constitution handicap. It doesn't take much before I'm down and out. Many matchups feel unfair. My attitude in reaction to this has become to simply throw myself at people, and either succeed quickly or fail quickly. I'm resigned to the fact that my tools don't necessarily match up to those of others.

This game, like many others, isn't balanced. Some have incredibly great and effective characteristics, while others just get screwed. At one point I felt like I was unstoppable, but those days are behind me now. There's always the promise of a better game-- so then why should I bother learning this one?

It's because of all this that I choose not to play in tournament. When anything real is on the line, I opt out. I'm afraid of what people might think of me when they see me in that situation, or maybe just ashamed of my own ability to talk the talk but not play real footsies. I'll definitely beat up on randoms in casuals out of boredom, but I'll never go for the prize, for fear of how I'll feel when I lose.

I don't hate the player. I don't hate the game. I hate the character. But I'm too proud to counter pick in real life.

Handsome fighters never lose battles.

Vega

He's a (New) Star

Those who actually succeed in life... They just happen to be born with the magic ticket called "talent." If you don't have it, you can either accept or deny that fact until you die. That's your only choice.

Tohru Adachi

I'm really lucky. I've been really lucky. At some point, I figured my residence on Easy Street was reward for my natural talent and hard work, but that has since been wholly proven false. The most important lesson I learned from art school was that I had no real talent-- which was fine, since the other lesson learned was that I had no real passion for it either. And hard work? I've never really known what that was.

I always thought that life would only ever got harder. One year ago I was prepared for working life to be ten times worse than student life, so I prepared furiously, making sacrifices in my own hopes and dreams as well as my relationships with others. Do I regret it? In some cases, definitely. But maybe that's why my life is so easy now.

I tried so hard to mitigate the trials and tribulations of adult life, and I succeeded in almost every way. But was it worth it? Is my reward for making my life boring a very easy and boring life?

Maybe I'm just not lucky enough.

Luck favors the prepared.

Louis Pasteur

Ace Combat 6

Jet fighters are basically designed to be awesome incarnate: fast, loud, destructive, and invincible to any other form of war machine.

In fact, the only problem with making games about jet planes is this: how does the game designer portray the godly power of these planes while still presenting a meaningful challenge to the player?

Ace Combat 6 dances that line admirably with its level design. While the player's jets are exaggerations of their real-life counterparts, the scenarios the game provides for them require the use of every bit of their physics-defying power.

Unlike Ace Combat 5, AC6 utilizes its fictional Emmerian Air Force in a somewhat believeable fashion-- as support for its ground forces. A large-scale attack in this game involves several concurrent operations, with groups of allies approaching their own objectives. The player is not tasked with winning the war by himself, but rather to assist the effort as a whole.

Unfortunately for the Emmerian military, these multi-operation missions are designed such that providing enough support for every operation to be successful is deliberately made to be impossible.

Though the player has the godly ability to easily destroy many targets from kilometers away, there will always be more allies praying for assistance than he can attend to. With great power comes even greater responsibility, indeed!

This level design philosophy forces the player to make decisions on who to support and who to leave on the wayside, i.e. to concede to his inability to win the war by himself. Creating this emotion inside the player is a triumph in level design-- while other flight action games communicate the worth of a multimillion dollar war machine through sheer destructive force, AC6 sends the same message by making the player understand that there are never enough of these machines to go around.

Brand Loyalty

College was a time for new things-- for me, new facial cleansers.

The smells of Neutrogena reminded me of high school in all the wrong ways, OXY annoyed me with its wannabe minimalist branding, and Clean and Clear were two adjectives with which I could not relate.

Then there was Nivea For Men. I couldn't really vouch for "Nivea," but "For Men" was pretty easy to understand. Clearly, it was the one brand available that was actually meant for me.

(aside-- I wholeheartedly believe that it is completely sensible to judge vanity-fueling products by wholly superficial standards.)

I started off with their Energizing Cleanser, which is of course discontinued because it was too awesome. After my great experience with their solutions, I began to try their other lines.

This is how a tragedy unfolds.

Nivea For Men's lip care products are the worst excuses for self-pampering items in all of Duane Reade. The effectiveness, longevity. texture, and even packaging are completely half-assed. There is no excuse.

I'm on that Blistex now, thanks.

Warrior Princess

I don't like iTunes. I don't like how long it takes to boot, the bloated internet connectivity, the limited playback features, its arcane organization / file copying schemes, all of it. But I figured it's the most appropriate way for an internet thug like me to support musicians that I like.

Amazon MP3, though. Here's where it wins:

• "Preview All" button to go through all the samples of an entire album. When buying music online, this is clutch because it's always a toss up whether or not to buy more than one song for the better deal.
• DRM-free MP3 files. No brainer. Sucks to be you, Apple!
• I always have a browser open anyway.

Hooray for Amazon MP3!

Why I Like Blazblue

Non-physical competitive gaming, when not luck-based, basically comes in two main flavors: Chess-type and Poker-type.

In a Chess-type game, the entirety of a game is laid out for all to see, which every element's possibilities known beforehand. Since there are so many possible actions to take, the onus is on the players to utilize the predetermined legal actions to overcome his opponent, while he mindfully watches his opponent attempting the same thing. Having the right pieces in the right positions at the right times is not an important objective in chess-- it is the only objective.

On the other hand, in a Poker-type game, the elements of the game world are hidden. Neither player has any way of knowing what cards the other has, nor any influence on how the game will unfold. The only thing these players have to go on is each other-- a pro poker player and a scrub will statistically get the same number of fantastic hands throughout their careers, but the pro player will be able to win more through means other than simply having better cards.

Fighting games can really go either way. On one hand, the legal characters, their attributes, and abilities are all predetermined and known fully by all involved, similar to the way everyone knows how chess pieces are allowed to move. This is of course at the theoretical highest level of play.

Unfortunately not everyone can reach this level of gaming prowess, and the game changes. Almost regardless of the game, the adage that allows absolute beginners to begin to improve is, "When in a position where one option is to block, then block." It it similar to poker-- in a high pressure environment with limited information on what the opponent will do, it is often a very good choice to simply do nothing. Statistically speaking, the game will reward the player for opting not to play.

Just as the cowardly poker player will simply fold out every time until he's dealt a killer hand, many fighting games reward players that do nothing until a braindead opportunity. In Dead or Alive, I'm not sure there is a single feasible move that will result with frame advantage on block. This results in the two DOA players simply guarding, hoping the other person opts to play the game (to attack) possibly out of boredom, statistically putting him at a disadvantage.

Blazblue is cool because it, through many game systems, favors the attacker in almost any situation. Although the relentless pressure capability of Guilty Gear's False Roman Cancel is gone, a player pressing buttons has an easier time winning than one that doesn't, which is a refreshing change.

I like pushing buttons.

Happy Birthday from Youtube!

50 new subscribers in a day? Just what I've always wanted. How did they know?

Eureka

It's 6:00 AM. Didn't sleep last night. Too much excitement and planning for a business venture of mine. Ran out of notebook space to scribble on, and had to go to the Duane Reade (24 hours!) to buy new notebooks just now. And for the first time ever, the streets of New York smelled refreshing.

Right now, I must be the happiest I've ever been for my entire time in the city.

No Rest for the Weary

Well, maybe a little rest.

What's Really Good?!

So, King of Fighters! Kyo is right when he says that if you speak English, you probably haven't played these games. Not an issue.

What's really interesting here is the rock-paper-scissors dynamic of the game. In King of Fighters, it seems to work mostly like this:

JAB beats JUMP devastates SWEEP beats JAB

What's really interesting here is that all of these things are attacks. King of Fighters is designed like a super action-heavy anime, with their opponents constantly attacking. There's not nearly as much holding back as other games.

Given the risk/reward setup, in King of Fighters, the "default option" is a jump attack.

Its kissing cousin, Street Fighter, looks something more like this:

BLOCK devastates ANTI-AIR beats JUMP can beat BLOCK

The massively unequal set of rewards here are what really makes Street Fighter a mindgame fest. The easiest way to get big damage in the game is to trick the opponent into thinking that you're going to jump... the layers of yomi (reading the opponent) are paramount to winning.

Default option in Street Fighter: Block

Virtua Fighter:

BLOCK mostly beats ATTACK beats THROW mostly beats BLOCK

Compared to the other games, the high-level counters of Virtua Fighter are very "soft," which means that a champion at this game must understand all the low-level, character- and situation-specific strategies. This generally translates into understanding the minutiae of frame data, as well as reading the opponent well-- these counters are nullified with systems like throw break, throw clash, and guard break.

Default option in VF: Block

Tekken:
BLOCK mostly beats ATTACK is faster than THROW often beats BLOCK

Tekken's layout is similar to VF's, the main exception being that attacks and throws are on equal footing. It is completely situation-specific, though in most situations attacks will win. Also, blocking is not a foolproof way to stop attacks, as there are plenty of safe pressure options that will continue an offense against a blocker.

Default option in Tekken: Attack

Soul Calibur:

ATTACKS have better range than THROWS can beat DEFENSE can beat ATTACKS

Soul Calibur's gameplay is hard to break down into such broad strokes. Ever since SC3, the series has been adding more and more exceptions to rules than much else. What's important for this discussion is that throws are easy to react to in this game, though unlike Tekken, the defending player must guess at which break to execute.

Default option in SC: Defense

Dead or Alive:

DEFENSIVE HOLD devastates ATTACK devastates THROW devastates DEFENSIVE HOLD

DOA is all about intensely hard counters. If one player knows exactly what the other player will do, he can be rewarded with up to 50% life per guess. The incredibly high stakes nature of the game is exciting and fun, but the standard deviation of win percentages (the only way to judge relative skill at the game) is very high.

Default option in DOA: Block (to avoid the high-stakes rock paper scissors)

Just for Fun

"Like, some people say they go to parties for fun. But all parties are different, and most parties aren't all that much fun."

Jonathan Blow

The creator of Braid came to our school to give a talk about game design the other day. Not surprisingly, he is far more concerned about the meaning of life than about how "fun" something is. But if doesn't play games for fun, then why does he devote his life to them?

The truth is that in games, this kind of thinking doesn't really come up. For as long as a game is on screen, the player has a temporary meaning of life-- he knows why he's there and what his purpose is. He knows how to gauge his level of ability, and he knows how to improve on it. Life is not necessarily easy, but it is easy to understand.

Speaking of fun, software development is not fun. Why do I want to make games so bad then? I'm not the best programmer, the best artist, or the most revolutionary designer, so what do I have to bring to the table?

Or maybe I'm just subconsciously trying to make my life more like the games I play. Where have a clear goal, clear obstacles with clear solutions, and an immediate reward for doing the right thing.

Oh, and infinite retires in case I get it wrong.

Unforgettable

Unforgettable
That's what you are
Unforgettable
Though near or far
Like a song of love that clings to me
How the thought of you does things to me
Never before has someone been more

Unforgettable
In every way
And forevermore
That's how you'll stay
That's why, darling, it's incredible
That someone so unforgettable
Thinks that I am unforgettable too

"Men! There are just so many different devices for guys to not call you on now."

Liz Lemon

Almost Awesome

Spring break project status: failure. But I bet Mike's looks way worse...