Castle Magus

Seems like an appropriate day for it.

---

"All obstructions to the execution of the Laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, controul, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force---to put in the place of the delegated will of the nation, the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprizing minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common councils, and modified by mutual interests.

"However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people, and to usurp for themselves the reins of government; destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion."

-- George Washington, excerpted from his 1796 Farewell Address

(It's basically this post again, except rewritten/transcribed so as to not be a series of now dead tweets.)

In the end, I honestly think it's going to take a complete dismantling of the GQP propaganda machine (i.e. RWNJ "news" "sources" that do nothing but constantly spew blatant lies) before anything will begin to change for the better, re: the absurdity that is American politics. On the one hand, you could blame the stupid, ignorant, gullible, hateful GQP voter base for the problem. Or, on the other hand, you could blame the cynical, disingenuous, vile, hateful ones in power (in govt or elsewhere) who so deftly manipulate the former. Both are bad. However, while both of those two things are bad, it is only through the RWNJ "news" "sources" acting as the middleman that the latter are so consistently successful at conning the former with their brazen bullshit. This has been going on for several decades by this point in time.

How we, as a society, could begin to effect this restorative process, though, I have absolutely no idea, because BOTH the stupid, ignorant, gullible, hateful ones AND the cynical, disingenuous, vile, hateful ones will fight tooth and nail to prevent such a thing from happening. Freeze peach issues be damned; the constant, deliberate, belligerent, incessant, blatant disinformation flow is going to have to be stopped, somehow, one way or another, and that, in my opinion, is the one, single, biggest issue in this country that needs fixing above all others. Very little else of any significant, lasting value is going to be accomplished (and, in fact, will be, is being, and has been actively suppressed and demolished) while this, the largest, most glaring problem, continues to exist, in my opinion. Just wish I knew what could be done.

And, for that matter, though there are far fewer such things, any similar bullshit sources coming from the left need to be shut down as well. The years of Walter Cronkite and Edward R. Murrow are long behind us, but we kind of need to get that back if we're ever going to recover. Basically, what I'm saying is that the separation between "news" and "entertainment" once again needs to be made clear and distinct, and there needs to be much, MUCH harsher penalties (i.e. more than none at all whatsoever) levied against "news" sources that spread flagrant lies. Having a more robust and trustworthy news media would also make us, as a whole, far less vulnerable to foreign shenanigans (*cough*Russia*cough*) as well, as American "news" "sources" taking foreign propaganda and treating it as "news" is a big facet of this shit-encrusted gem.

Another related facet is the entirety of social media, in general, and certain social media platforms, in particular. But that's a whole other gargantuan problem that I also don't have the slightest clue how to begin to go about tackling.

Anyway, yeah, news media is busted. Broken. Fucked up almost beyond all recognition of what used to be thought of as "news." And until that entire problem is rectified, the country as a whole is going to continue to remain fucked, too, no matter what else may happen. Shit sucks.

---

Many times in the past, I've made statements along the lines of "I don't know which is worse, the ones in power who are doing the conning or the ones underneath who are being conned." Now, I think I've finally settled on it being the middlemen, the ones that are facilitating the conmen and the dupes alike, that is the real problem that needs to be fixed. Somehow.

This post here is essentially a sequel to an earlier post I made back in March. I'm just going to copy/paste some rantage I did over on Facebook into this post.

( Rant behind cut )

We all know Hanlon's razor, right?

"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."

In many cases, that's a good philosophy to live by. However, when it comes to Donald Trump and his administration (as well as those currently leading Congress who back him), I believe that the inverse can and perhaps should be applied.

"Never dismiss as mere stupidity that which is indeed actively malicious."

For example, take the recent brouhaha over crowd sizes at the inauguration. Yes, it might seem incredibly stupid for Sean Spicer to hold a press conference in which he blatantly, clearly lied. Yes, it might seem absolutely asinine that Kellyanne Conway then doubled down on it with that "alternative facts" bullshit. "Alternative facts," otherwise known by sane people as blatant, clear lies.

But here's the thing. I don't think the above things were just stupid. Don't get me wrong, they are stupid, but I don't think they're only stupid. I think that these people, more than simply being stupid, are being indeed actively malicious. For a long while now, Trump has been very critical of the press (except, of course, for a few outliers that Trump treats, for the most part, as golden children, such as Faux Noise and Bratbarf Noise [after all, fucking Steve Bannon, former head of Bratbarf, is Trump's Chief Strategist now, heaven help us all]). Lately, Trump's go-to ploy when a piece of news comes out that is critical of him is to simply label said piece of news as "fake news" and dismiss it out of hand.[1] Trumpster fires and sockpuppets on social media then repeat Trump's bawling and amplify it by several orders of magnitude.

Yes, they could have ignored the whole inauguration crowd size thing. That, one would think, would have been the smart thing to do. Had they done so, most people would have simply chuckled over it for a day or two, and then it would have been completely forgotten within a week. But now, thanks to the Streisand effect, because they have focused in on this relatively trivial issue, it has been in the forefront of news for days now, and likely will remain so, especially if they continue to harp on it. (EDIT) Which they are. (/EDIT)

The purpose for this is two-fold. For one thing, it serves quite well as yet another petty distraction from all of the terrible shit that Trump has done in just his first few days in office. Diversion from the real issues with infantile bullshit like this is yet another of Trump's unfortunately successful tactics. In other words, they have weaponized the Streisand effect. So there is that.

However, more importantly, this fracas over crowd sizes is, again, yet another small cog in the ongoing machinery employed by the Trump administration, the sole purpose of which is to discredit the press. And, as I've said before and as I'm sure I'll say again, this machinery has been running far too smoothly. Far, far, FAR too many gullible morons take Trump's claims at face value. They treat his words as unvarnished, gospel truth. They believe him when he says that the press is lying, and that the press is only out to "get him." And, of course, they also believe all the other blatant, clear lies that Trump and his administration (and before that his transition team, and before that his campaign, and before that just Trump, the man) have been incessantly telling.

"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."
"Never dismiss as mere stupidity that which is indeed actively malicious."

One of these statements applies to the Trump administration. I believe it to be the latter, but I also believe that it ultimately will have to be left up to posterity to determine which was the more applicable of the two. Are Trump and his flunkies and his Trumpanzees merely stupid? Or are they actively malevolent? Or, perhaps, are they some degrees of both of those things? Because, indeed, stupidity and malice are not mutually exclusive states of being and have never been. Even if it's hampered by stupidity, ham-handed malice is still malice. Anyway, time will tell. But the one thing I can absolutely assure you of is that it is at least one of those two. (EDIT) And as the entirely of Trump's abhorrent time in office, including the very ass end of it, ultimately showed us, it was absolutely the latter. (/EDIT)

[1] - And, no, it obviously doesn't help at all when overzealous reporters jump the gun and report on something that didn't happen, instead of pausing and making sure they had their goddamn ducks in a row first. It doesn't even matter that this "story" was merely a few tweets by one guy, and that the guy has already apologized and retracted his erroneous statements. The damage has already been done, and now Trump has more ammunition for his otherwise ludicrous "fake news" hysterics.

For reference, here is my original post about the Tropes vs Women in Video Games series of videos.

Same as before, I'm just going to embed all of the Tropes vs Women in Video Games videos that have been released since that previous post.

( Youtube embeds behind cut )

To repeat what I said in the previous post, regardless of whether or not you actually agree with the content of the above videos, just keep in mind that this is the kind of thing that Irredeemably Toxic Shithole (aka GamerGate) wants to prevent you from seeing. This is what is "corrupting" video games and video game journalism, according to them. This is what they're trying to silence and do away with, through threats of violence, rape, death, and invasion of privacy against the creator of these videos and those like her. (But, actually, it's about ethics in video game journalism.)

As for me, Ms. Sarkeesian didn't say anything that caused me to vehemently shake my head in disagreement, nor did she say anything that caused me to widen my eyes in shock, either. None of this is new to me. Like I also said in the previous post: shit's terrible.

She's not wrong, regardless of whatever Irredeemably Toxic Shithole may try to claim to the contrary.

(EDIT 4 - 9/23/2020) Also relevant: this. (/EDIT 4)

(EDIT 5 - 3/24/2022) And this. (/EDIT 5)

Yesterday, I was reading some recent tweets by Dan Shive, the creator of El Goonish Shive, concerning the new King's Quest game. At first, he was simply praising the game (starting around here), but later on, he began to rant (starting around here) about the fact that people were apparently telling him on Twitter not to support the new King's Quest game because of something about The Odd Gentlemen (who developed the new KQ game) and their previous involvement with Hiveswap, the game based on the hugely popular webcomic series, Homestuck. (Let me tell you about Homestuck.) Apparently, there are vague rumors that they misappropriated money from the Hiveswap Kickstarter (which, sadly [or perhaps luckily], I didn't back, because I didn't know about Homestuck at all until well after that had ended) to help fund the King's Quest game. I don't know if that's true or not. If it is, then The Odd Gentlemen are indeed scumbags. However, that is (mostly) irrelevant to the point I am about to make here.

See, I agree with Mr. Shive, for the most part. I think it's kind of dumb to hate on a work of art, be it a video game or a book or music or whatever, merely because you dislike something that the artist said or did (within reason). Hell, I've even said the same sort of thing myself already, years back when I was ranting about Doug TenNapel and his asinine views on the Quran burnings, in which I also mentioned Orson Scott Card and his homophobia[1], among other things as well. Hell, I still play some EA games, such as The Sims 3, even though I hate EA with a fiery passion otherwise (and despite the fact that there are things specifically concerning The Sims 3 itself that make me hate EA with a fiery passion).

However, as Mr. Shive himself also says, I can understand why one might not want to actively give money to an artist (or a game dev, in this case) since that money would actively go to support that artist in their future endeavors, which might include things that one might not want to be involved with. That's completely fair. If you believe the allegations concerning The Odd Gentlemen and want to avoid supporting them by not buying the new KQ game, then more power to you. Hell, even though I still play some EA games, like The Sims 3, I haven't bought any other EA games at all since probably (EDIT a year or so later) Dragon Age IIThe Sims 4. Yeah, I finally caved and bought TS4 on Origin, when it was on a relatively dirt cheap sale overall. >_> (/EDIT)

But again, at the same time, to say that someone shouldn't recommend or even like the new King's Quest game because of some tangentially related thing that The Odd Gentlemen may or may not have done regarding Hiveswap... well, I don't know. I think it's kind of dumb to hate King's Quest over this. For what it's worth, to go with what is probably the most extreme example of this, I think what I've seen of Hitler's paintings are actually pretty good. Yes, I totally went there. ¬_¬ Or, perhaps more timely... will I say that I would never go back and watch (and maybe even possibly enjoy) an episode of The Cosby Show or I Spy or Fat Albert or whatever, due to the current shitstorm surrounding Bill Cosby? If even a small portion of that shit is true, if he only drugged and raped even just one person, let alone dozens, then Cosby is a complete and total shitbag, sure... but I don't think that means that there's now suddenly nothing whatsoever of value that can be found in those older works of his, so no, I'm not sure that I will say that I'd never do that. Nor will I claim that I'd never go back and watch a Chris Benoit wrestling match. Yeah, I know I'm starting to stretch the meaning of the phrase "work of art" there, but still... Benoit was in some pretty good matches.

In any case, as long as whatever crazy, unethical, bullshit things done by the creators don't or didn't directly affect the nature of their works, then I'm not going to straight up avoid those works entirely just because of that. If, on the other hand, whatever asinine things they do are indeed directly affecting the works themselves, then that's where I start boycotting shit (and that's a big part of the reason I don't buy EA games anymore, specifically, and why I'm starting to abandon the game industry as a whole, generally). But I also totally get how this is definitely a YMMV situation.

(EDIT 2 - 4/19/2018)

To be honest, I find myself dithering on all of this, as the years have gone by since I originally wrote this post. For example, given all the shit that has come out surrounding Channel Awesome recently, I cannot in good conscience continue to watch or support that company by continuing to watch Nostalgia Critic videos as though nothing had happened, even if said shit may not directly affect the content of any given Nostalgia Critic video (though there have been some instances of scuzziness even there which are now put under a new light in retrospect, so... yeah). At this point in time, I am pretty certain that I will not be supporting any future endeavors of the Walker brothers or anyone still associated with them after this. And as for Justin "JewWario" Carmical, I didn't bother to watch any of the guy's stuff when he was alive or in the years after he died when he was being sanctified seemingly by almost everyone on the Internet, so I'm sure as shit not going to start now, not even out of morbid curiosity.

But again, I am only speaking for myself here. For anyone else who has watched Justin Carmical's or Doug Walker's stuff and found value in that, I'm not going to try to go all Moral Guardian here and say that you can't or shouldn't do that. I'm just saying that I am not going to be doing it, myself, at least for the foreseeable future.

Anyway, back to the original post, now.

(/EDIT 2 - 4/19/2018)

Disclaimer: I have not played the new King's Quest game yet, mainly because I refuse to play any episodic games until the whole series of episodes is available, but I most likely will play it at some point, regardless of any controversy that may be surrounding it. (Unless, perhaps, said controversy actually turns out to be true, but even then... I'm still taking the same "wait and see" approach as I was before, concerning the new KQ game.) (EDIT 3) I have indeed played a little ways into the first episode, since I wrote the above. It's... okay, I guess? Not enough so that I actually finished it (yet) obviously, but it's mostly inoffensive, I suppose. (/EDIT 3) I have read Homestuck, and I believe that it is indeed as awesome as most people say it is. I'm looking forward to Hiveswap. For that matter, EGS is also pretty cool, I think.

[1] - And I thought I'd made another post along the same lines as this one here and that other one specifically concerning Mr. Card and the new (at the time) Ender's Game movie as well, about how a lot of people apparently thought that Mr. Card's homophobia tainted the movie too much for them to enjoy it or want to go see it, but I couldn't find such a post. Maybe that post was made to Facebook or something instead of Livejournal, in which case screw it, I'm not hunting it up. *shrug* Or maybe I just started to write such a post but then deleted it without finishing it. There have been a ton of posts that I've almost made like that.

You know what? Screw it. I'm just going to post the "Tropes vs Women in Video Games" videos right here. Up to now, I'd only watched the first one back when it was first posted last year, and didn't really feel the need to watch the rest, because she wasn't telling me anything I didn't already know, but I went ahead and watched the rest of them today.

( Multiple Youtube videos behind cut )

So let's just be clear here. Whether you agree with the above videos or not, keep in mind that this, in large part, is the sort of thing that GamerGate supporters[1] are trying to suppress through the use of rape/death threats and "doxxing" against people like Ms. Sarkeesian. This is what GamerGate doesn't want people to see. (But, actually, it's about ethics in games journalism, amirite?)

I've played several of the games that are depicted in the above videos, such as Red Dead Redemption. RDR is probably my favorite game made by Rockstar. Still, with that said, I'm not even going to begin to try to deny that what Ms. Sarkeesian says is true about RDR or any of the other games shown. I'm not going to try to mitigate it or rationalize it or justify it or whatever. She's right, plain and simple. I may not be Sarkeesian's biggest fan in the world, but I still think she's right in what she's saying here. Shit's terrible.

But is it really as bad as she makes it out to be? A few months ago, I probably would have told you no, it's not. But in light of all the recent GamerGate bullshit, I'm much more inclined now to believe that she does indeed have a point, that maybe it really is that bad, and that the misogynistic asshats in the GamerGate movement are a direct consequence and example of this sort of thing (and that, ultimately, perhaps I need to reassess my own less-than-favorable opinion of Ms. Sarkeesian herself, primarily because most of the "proof" that supposedly "debunked" her that I read in the past all came from the same sort of assholes who are now GamerGate supporters, and I'd simply took that shit at face value until now).

I'm not saying that video games made these people into misogynistic asshats, any more than I believe violence in video games "trains" people to be terrorists or serial killers or whatever. I just think that, in this case at least, people who were already misogynistic asshats are simply using this whole thing as an excuse to be even bigger misogynistic asshats, that's all.

[1] - Unless, of course, you buy into the bullshit that it's not actually GamerGate supporters sending those threats and doxxing women and such, but really some kind of ridiculous false flag thing staged by anti-GamerGate people.

This is now my official policy for all current/future gen games going forward: 1) Do not buy on initial release. 2) Wait and see if there is any DLC coming. If there is, 3a) wait until a complete edition (aka "Game of the Year" or "Ultimate" or even "Complete" as some have called it) of the game is released, wait until that is <$20-$30 (including all DLC), and (maybe) buy it then. Or 3b) if no complete edition is forthcoming, then wait until the base game is <$10-$20 and then (maybe) buy it then, and then wait until the DLC for the game goes on sale and (maybe) buy it then. If there is no DLC coming (which is more and more rare these days), then 4) wait until the game is <$20-$30 and then (maybe) buy it then. Only if such a game from point 4 comes from a company that has a proven track record of not screwing its customers over, then I might be more lenient on that <$20-$30 price point and willing to buy at a higher price. If said company ever starts doing shitty things (e.g. lots of crappy, pointless DLC or Day 1 DLC or draconian DRM [including always-online-even-for-singleplayer], etc.), then they immediately and forever go on my shit list with all the others. In any case, I am fully willing to do without altogether, if that's what it ends up coming down to.

Essentially, what I'm saying here is that I have decided that $50-$60+ for a video game (even, and especially, before any DLC is taken into consideration) is simply more than I'm willing to pay, these days. If a game has online-only DRM (or some other form of equally idiotic, draconian DRM), then that raises an immediate "do not buy, ever" flag for me (e.g. Command & Conquer 4, Diablo 3, Sim City 5, etc.), until and unless said DRM is removed. Even if it is removed later, however, it's still likely that I won't buy the game, ever. If a game has Day 1 DLC, then that also raises a definite "wait and see, and probably not buy, ever" flag. I've bought games with Day 1 DLC in the past, but no more. At the very most, the policy in that case would be to wait until point 3a above occurs, otherwise I will do without. If it's proven that all or most of the DLC is already on the game's disc at launch, then my willingness to buy said game at any price will be reduced to near zero. Simple as that.

"You'd think ... that Westwood would still be around, making smash hits in every genre they touched, but sadly, it was not to be. Bought by Electronic Arts 1998, aside from Command & Conquer and Dune games the studio's output soon dries up, the Westwood name split across two studios which released things like failed MMO Earth & Beyond and under-appreciated action game Nox.

In 2002, shortly after the failure of Command & Conquer Renegade, Westwood was severely downsized by EA, and a year later the studio itself was closed, those remaining staff absorbed into EA's other studios.

It's a shocking demise for a developer that during the 1990's was, pound-for-pound, perhaps the most successful Western studio going around. What makes it especially sad is the waste of Westwood's expertise in its years under EA's ownership."

I own Command and Conquer: Renegade. It's not great, but it's not nearly as bad as people like to make it out to be. I also own Nox, which was a half-way decent Diablo-clone, from what little I recall of it, though I never got very far into it. Anyway, I think the key point to be taken from the above, and from the article in general, is that everything was pretty much coming up all roses for Westwood Studios... until they got bought by Electronic Arts.

( The usual anti-EA rant behind cut for the uninterested )

Anyway, to get back on the subject of Westwood, since I got off-track there, as I usually tend to do when the subject of EA and all the companies they have ruined over the years comes up...

As is pointed out in the article, while everyone mostly remembers Westwood for Command and Conquer, it wasn't just a one-trick pony. It is notable for things like the amazing Legend of Kyrandia series as well. Here's a little fun-fact. The guy who did the voice for Brandon in all three games? Kane. And while I'm on the subject of the Kyrandia series here, I am absolutely appalled that these games are on neither GOG nor Steam yet, or seemingly anywhere else for that matter, aside from the used markets like eBay or Amazon Marketplace or whatever. Hopefully with the new cooperation between EA and GOG that will be rectified soon. Not that many (or any, for all I know) of the former Westwood guys will ever see a dime from it, of course. (EDIT 2) Finally, the Kyrandia games are up on GOG now, so that's good. (/EDIT 2)

Also, the Lion King SNES and Genesis games. I honestly had no idea until now that these were made by Westwood Studios. That just makes me even more sad that they ended up getting wrecked by EA.

"Shenmue Finally Gets A Sequel…Sort Of"

"Young Ryo Hazuki's tale might not be over, however."

Elated!

"Earlier today, Yahoo! Japan and the Japanese-based web service provider, DeNA, announced a partnership to develop a new community-based Internet game portal. The companies also announced that one of the first titles for the service would be a new Shenmue game. Titled Shenmue Machi (which translates into Shenmue Town), this title is being planned as a new kind of 'social game.' Whatever that means."

And.... elated no longer.

I don't want this Yahoo! Japan "social game" crap. I want Shenmue 3.

Are they sure that this is even related to the real Shenmue games at all and isn't just some crappy thing that happens to share the same name? I notice it doesn't say that Sega or Yu Suzuki are involved in this at all.

(EDIT)

I guess Sega might be involved after all. Still, all I can do in response to this is give the heartiest of "Meh"s.

(/EDIT)

(EDIT 2)

I'm seeing people ruminating over the possibility that this might be Sega attempting to "test the waters" to see if there is still interest in Shenmue before committing to something more substantial.

Here is why that is a bad idea: If most other people are like me, then they most definitely do want another Shenmue game. However, they want another real Shenmue game, one that continues the story that ended on a blatant cliffhanger at the end of Shenmue 2. They don't want this barely related "social game" BS.

As such, ifwhen it appears that nobody gives a crap about this particular new Shenmue game, they will get the very mistaken impression that nobody cares about Shenmue at all, in general. Thus, they will likely conclude that it is not worthwhile to invest further in the Shenmue franchise.

It was the same deal with that racing game that came out a while back that had Ryo Hazuki in it. Including him in that was also apparently a "testing the waters" moment. Well, yeah, sure, as far as I'm concerned it's great that he's in it and all, but I'm not buying some crappy racing game that I otherwise don't give a rat's ass about just because it has Ryo Hazuki in it. Again, I want Shenmue 3, not "Generic Sega Version of Super Mario Kart, featuring Ryo Hazuki."

Anyway, this new thing seems like it's going to be a Japan only game anyway, so it doesn't really matter one way or another to me, as such. Maybe the Japanese will be all over it. *shrug* Then again, that might give them a different mistaken impression that they need to make more games like that, instead of a real Shenmue 3.

Well, in any case, the bottom line is that they need to make Shenmue 3. Period.

(/EDIT 2)