I have tried my hardest to avoid politics since the day I carved my own name into the blogosphere. Reason being that no one will give an apeshit about what a 17 year old thinks about the politics. I obviously don't watch real news (that would be anything without John Stewart or Stephen Colbert), and have no experience about life to voice my opinion about jack of all shit.

I know this, which is why I made it policy that it wouldn't be discussed here. However, I've been told today is such an important day so I'm going out on a limb here and I will talk about politics.

Like millions of other people I watched the inaguration today. Actually, to be fair I watched everything leading up to it, went to lunch where there was no television present, and went to my sixth period class where I was just in time to catch the last half of the president's speech. I missed him actually being sworn in which was pretty much the entire point of today anyway...and I missed it because I needed to stuff my face with what the Bordentown school district calls Chinese food.
 
Today was probably the first day since 9/11 that every television was simultaniously on in our building today. For many of us it was a complete throw day as we pretty much did nothing but listen to the CNN coverage of the events in the capital.

Watching the inaguaration inside a classroom is like having the worse case of mixed company ever. Any teacher who tried ushering a classroom conversation about the event probably wished they hadn't. Charles Manson would've been proud listening to the thoughts of the youth as they asked "What if Obama gets shot?" and the topic of race wars was brought up. Surely no one in their right mind thinks that our 44th Commander and Chief will bring forth a Helter Skelter do they?

Apparently so. Mind you this is the very same discussion that I was accused of being a racist twice.

And people wonder why I don't talk politics.

The first time I was accused it was because I said Barack Obama hasn't done anything yet, the second time because I defended John McCain. Not like I said I would vote for the guy, or that he should've won, rather I said he wasn't a bad man who's served for his country and shouldn't be called a racist man just because he ran against Barack. It bothers me that someone who endured tortured in Vietnam for his country could 50 years later be strike the image of a baby eating, throat fucking, nazi-satan.

That might be better than what became of Sarah Palin though. On a side note I just found out that I share a birthday with cougar porn star Lisa Ann, thank you Wikipedia.

The sad thing that I witnessed today was that for all the progression Obama has made already for the status of African American people it's all being retracted by a sector of his supporters.

Here's to hoping that all changes soon.

I have nothing of wit to say tonight. Maybe tomorrow.

"Together, you and I will identify and confront America's problems. Together we will figure out what we are and what we can be. Together we will define the American dream and make it an American reality."
- Captain America



That's it, I'm done. Fucking politics.

I'll see you next election if your lucky.
 

By the means of our public education system, I was graced with a four day weekend. I kicked that weekend off today by looking like a scumbag.

I haven't shaved in about 2.5 days which gives me the look of that kid you went to high school with who was so desparate to look tough, he didn't shave no matter how bad the crustache was. On top of that I have the compulsive need to shower everyday because my hair gets oily and shitty so fast and I have no desire to look like a stereotypical Italian male (I'm half Italian by the way, I'm simply not proud of that part of my heritage).

For those not in my little burb of Bordentown the weather here is best described as shit. We got snow which, when it was snowing, was simply beautiful and and enjoying to walk in because although it was cold, there wasn't that annoying wind chill that makes me call for nuclear winter. We got just enough snow falling at just the right rate to make mother nature be classified as a petty stripper. We got maybe less than an inch which does nothing but create an annoyance as it's not enough to let my inner child sing and go sledding, but enough to fuck up the roads and make my drive to work a living hell. I'm calling stripper shenanigans on nature because this snow was nothing but a horrible tease and that's exactly what strippers are.

I know this is LiveJournal where people come to bitch about how much their individual lives suck, but that's not why I'm here;

Behold for your musical listening Ziltoid the Omniscient.

I'm sort of a cock when it comes to music. Any band you like I probably hate. I probably hate that band because you like them. Or simply because you've elevated your view of said band to near-god status. That or they got too exposed in this just-myspace-it society we live and and I've growned annoyed with them. Example of this would be System of a Down. Great band, amazingly talented, and Toxicity  ranks in my favorite albums of all time. For as much as I love the band a stunning majority of fans, more so than most bands, have elevated them to the end all of music. By the time the double Mezmorize / Hypnotize came out, although I had enjoyed the album, I got so annoyed with their fans and the idiots who write Kerrang! magazine that I started to hate them, and ask me to this day, I still don't like them that much. The same idea can be applied to bands like Tool and Avenged Sevenfold (although I think Sevenfold sucks now and it's a combo of their fans and them).

I do have my favorites though. Some you might agree with and some you may not, but I have a reason for liking all of them. My playlist of music changes daily, but the list of bands / artists that I can always always always come back to never changes.

Sinatra
Killswitch Engage
Mastodon
Nine Inch Nails
Emery
Thrice
MC Lars
Isis
Anything with Devin Townsend
Blink-182
Bad Religion
Frank Zappa

That's the general list. Criticize it all you please

It should also be known that I'm a complete sucker for concept albums. Anything that tells a story through an entire album I'll give a shot. On that list alone six of those artist have done concept albums.


I chose Ziltoid the Omniscient for my topic tonight because it displays everything great about Devin Townsend.

 

I've always considered him the Frank Zappa of Metal. Zappa was one talented motherfucker musically, but lyrically took everything as a jokingly and as satirically as possible. Townsend does the same with what could be considered his heavy metal music. Townsend also writes little known ambient music that while still with the concept album approach, is a little more serious (see Synchestra). Townsend does the exact opposite of what's expect of metal, a genre that in my humble opinion, takes itself way too seriously. 


For people sick of the direness that metal seems to have I suggest the Devin Townsend album Ziltoid the Omniscient. You can YouTube the majority of the album so it's not going to be hard to find. The plot to the album is summarized as;

"The character named Ziltoid, from the planet Ziltoidia 9. Ziltoid travels to Earth in search for "the ultimate cup of coffee", in order for him to succeed time travel."

I wouldn't spend valuable time I could be sleeping if I didn't think it was at least worth mentioning.

Consider this my PSA for the week. If you hate it you can always go listen to the new Avenged Sevenfold cd.

I was going to update on Monday but I was still recovering but the letdown that was the Giants game on Sunday.

I was then going to update yesterday but I got caught between Precalc homework and watching Jack Swagger become our new ECW Champion.


I'm probably the only person I know who even bothers to watch ECW anymore, but even though the ratings are subpar (but amazing for Sci-Fi) the brand is quickly becoming my favorite of the three WWE shows.

Talk to anyone who even considers themself a wrestling fan and they'll tell you what an abomination the current ECW is,

Of course those people are comparing it to the only wrestling promotion that has ever come close to having the name cult attached to it's name. They're looking at the one time edgy, over the top, hardcore ECW that became the alternative to WCW and WWE(F at the time). The same promotion that essentially revolutionized the entire industry in the late 90's.

Even though I never really got into ECW when it was around I'm a direct product of the Attitude era which was influenced by ECW. I also hail from New Jersey which, along with Philadelphia and New York City, was part of the epicenter of ECW. If you're not from this area and consider yourself a true ECW die-hard I consider you an idiot. Until The Nashville Network (or TNN, now Spike TV) got a TV deal for ECW and put out it's watered down cable show most of Americana only heard of ECW by name. By that time the company was on it's death bed anyway (many seem to think TNN is what killed ECW). That was of course around '99 when the boom period of the industry was at it's peak. ECW at it's best was from '95 to '97, with it's highlight year being '96. Fans around this area are the ones you see still screaming "E-C-Dub! E-C-Dub!" at wrestling shows because they were the ones watching it on public access television at one in the morning constantly scrounging for any ECW material they can get. I was only five and six at this time, I don't consider myself an ECW fan because I wasn't really around for it. I do however highly regard and  appreciate classic ECW.

Around 2001 the WWF(yes still F) purchased the company and have been beating this already dead horse since then. The strong ECW DVD sales and "reunion" pay-per-views prompted Vince McMahon to bring ECW back this time as a brand.

At first this was kind of cool as they tried to establish the brand as one being not associated with the WWE and almost another sort of "Invasion" angle that they tried when the WWE absorbed ECW and WCW in 2001. They used a bunch of former ECW stars that were under contract with the company at the time (see Rob Van Dam, The Sandman, Sabu, Tommy Dreamer, Joey Styles, Tazz, etc...), and in a further attempt to diversify themselves labeled their stars Extremists (instead of Superstars) and the women were Vixens (not Divas). It wasn't really a bad idea but due to what I said above and my amazing entry on expectations if tanked. Reason being it could never be the ECW fans remembered. It was just WWE wrestling with hardcore makeup. Eventually the hardcore deal was dropped and ECW became ECW in name only. Most of the classic ECW stars left and the brand became the secondary show, something like a developmental brand for up and coming stars to get exposure. Because it's seen as a secondary brand no one but the die-hards (and me....go figure) watch it anymore.


It's a shame that people don't watch the show anymore, because, at least in my opinion it  has become more solid towards the end of 2008 and into 2009. The show has more wrestling than both Smackdown and Raw, and the matches are not only good, but they're matchups we haven't seen thousands of times before. I know I can only take seeing the JBL, Cena, Michaels, Orton, Batista tag mix so many times without getting bored.

Smackdown has nothing of interest to me. Hardy has the belt which is great, but until Christian comes back around the Royal Rumble, my TV won't be on Smackdown anytime soon.

Raw has more, but not much. After Jericho dropped the belt I started to care less about what happened. I could care less about Cena being the champion, and I really only watch it for the Orton / Legacy angle going on right now.

ECW on the other hand has it all to me. This weeks show opened with a mixed tag match between DJ Gabiel, Alicia Fox, Katie Lea, and Paul Burchill which, although nothing special showcased fundamental wrestling. Tommy Dreamer then came out a delivered an interesting promo claiming he will retire in June if he doesn't win the ECW title by then. The Boogeyman beat a jobber in a squash match, and Jack Swagger beat Matt Hardy in an excellent twentyfive minute TV match to win the title.

Honestly the show does it all to me. Showed up and coming talent (the opening tag match), started  up a potential angle (Tommy Dreamer), Built up growing talent (The Boogeyman), and featured a great wrestling match between a veteran and an up and comer.

And I don't  give a shit what you say, I love the Boogeyman. Call him a shitty wrestler, I don't care. Hulk Hogan was a shitty wrestler too but no one ever says he was bad. The Boogeyman is a character that they could do so much more with. Even despite his lack of in ring talent he is the perfect foil for someone like the Undertaker, his character is just that interesting to me.


Ahh....ok I'm done here.







Oh yeah and the minisite for the new Magic expansion Conflux launched today. Good news for me I'll have more magic cards soon.

I'm a little annoyed right now because the ball to my gauge chipped and fell off the actual gauge, so now I'm left looking retarted until my friend gives me a new ball (pink I might add) in choir tomorrow. I don't have what most people would consider gauges and actually I only have one ear pierced so I have one. My gauge is a size bigger than what a normal earring would look like in an ear. I believe it's what they call a size 16. I don't have those big huge gauges in my ears like some tribal women. I don't find them appealing nor do I care to have them, I simply got bored of the same old earring I had in my ear for about four years and decided hell I'll gauge it a size.

That said I'm tossing around the idea of getting my other ear gauged the same, or even going up a size or two. Nothing too big but larger than I have now.

Now that I've done that bit on the outstanding counter/fringe culture (that's what we call an intro) I want to throw around thoughts about the sister of body piercing, actually more of the brother of body modification let me correct myself.

Tattoos

Yep, in May I'll be 18 and can finally get a tattoo. 18 used to be the age you could vote and that was the big thing, now it's marking yourself  for the rest of  your adult life.

Don't get me wrong I've been thinking about getting a tattoo, maybe not on the 9th of May exactly, but somewhere down the line.


Tattoos were always traditionally in American culture something to rebel with, we all know this. The only people who used to get them were guys in the navy, bikers, and people in heavy metal bands. All of which (aside from maybe an honorable navyman) your parents wanted you to avoid.

Obviously with the dawn of the new century that taboo has dissolved and now tattoos are socially acceptable (almost) everywhere. If your a guy you can join a tribe and get a band around your arm. Religious? Get a cross on your bicep or a psalm on your back. New parent? get your kids face on your chest. Women have options ranging in a butterfly on their ankle to Japanese kanji on your shoulder, or hell get a heart right above your asscrack (classy).

We have tattoo fever in this culture now. Shows about tattoo parlors, five different tattoo magazines on newstands a month, people going apeshit over a celebrity and their new ink. If exotic piercings were the nineties than tattos are for the oo's (that's what I'm calling 2000 - 2010)

Going even further, eighteen isn't even the gateway age for this. In the four years I've spent in public high school Americana I've seen piles of kids barely sixteen sporting ink. It used to be you if you had a tattoo by high school you were probably as well bahaved as Nelson Muntz. Since maybe sophomore I've seen....

1. The girl with the heart tramp stamp (as a memorial to her father who passed away)
2. The pot smoking, alcohol drowning basketball player with a cross on his arm
3. The girl with a horseshoe on the back of her neck (not an Indianapolis Colts fan I should add)
4. The kid with his name written in kinda-script on the inside of his arm (maybe incase he forgets his name some time)

I'm all for a rebellious act and all, but now the best way to rebel is to probably not get a tattoo at all. I've asserted myself as the anti-culteral at this point and believe that one, everybody is getting it done which therefor, makes it normal which equals not rebellious, which takes away from half the thoughts of people getting this done.

My other problem is one that maybe the examples above didn't think about.

You know...thats a tattoo is on your forever....

You know that a long time....

Like until you die...................................

Yeah

I've spent a long time thinking about what I would inscribe on my body for a while now, throwing out the stupid thoughts and really filtering out the crap, and getting rid of some things that sound cool but in my desire to be selective wouldn't make the cut. On the cutting room floor I have quotes from "A Clockwork Orange" and "1984"; both rank in my top 5 favorite novels of all time, and have enough meaning to make a nice quotation on my body. The other would be my family crest on my back, but although I'm passionate about family and my heritage, I don't think I'm going that far.

You see, I believe that a tattoo, once on your body, becomes a part of you, a representation of yourself, and you should pick the message the way you want to be represented the rest of your life. It should mean something truely deep to you. Something that isn't a spur of a moment thing. What the fuck does a horseshoe on your neck mean? Or the bumble bee on your ass? That cool tribal armband? What fucking tribe are you in when your a white bodybuilder.

It makes no sense, and I'm above doing something like that.


A good example in my opinion would be that I had a friend who died around three years ago. He got hit by a car and was only seventeen. Obviously taken way too soon. He always loved graffiti and made his own tag he would draw all the time. It was a pretty cool little symbol. When he passed a friend of mine wanted to get a tattoo in memorial, so instead of doing the normal "Name" "Year Born - Year Died" "Your Always Remembered" crap that every plants on their skin when such thing happens, he instead got the tag symbol that our friend had drawn on his arm. Nothing big, nothing fancy but a great tribute if you ask me.

It took thought and it's worthwhile

Just like a tattoo should be.

At this point in time I have picked two tattoos that I would get the day I turned eighteen if I could;

My first would be a quotation from my favorite poem by my favorite poet and literary idol, Zbigniew Herbert. This quote is taken from his poem Report From the Beseiged City and I used it as my quote for my senior yearbook. The line has always spoken to me in a very profound way,

" He shall carry the City within on the roads of exile."

I don't think it's a bad bit of writing to etch into your flesh.

The quote by him that I like (well ok, there's many from him) is something I live my life by as well. This isn't from a poem it's just a quotation from him,

"One always goes against the current to reach the wellsprings, it is the trash which flows with the current."


Again, you decide.



The other one I expect no one to understand and many will think it's stupid, but, I'm an avid Magic: The Gathering trading card game player. I find the game endlessly complex and you get what you put into it. I've been playing for years and don't plan to stop. In a summary of what I want, the game cards are divided into five colors (white, blue, black, red, green) and each has an element into the fantasy world, game philosophy, and also a life philosophy that even players may not understand. And example of gaming philosophy would be;

Red cards tend to be quick big hitters that are one time deals to kill an opponent quick

Blue cards are the opposite, as they use cards to counter another players moves and blue cards use manipulation and trickery rather than aggression to win.

As I said that's a bare bones version but I can go on about this for hours. The life philosophy for these specific colors would be interpreted as red being a temper and impulsive while blue would be an intellectual and witty. I believe strongly that these are the two extremes of my personality so I want the symbols associated with the colors on my front shoulders (one on each).



I've tried getting meaning out of these and I won't mark my skin with anything but meaning but until then I'm going to have a problem with American culture strangling itself with a tribal armband.

I found this today and found it quite interesting;

Chris Jericho did an interview talking about his current character on WWE television, and where he got his new character from.

As it turns out after seeing the movie No Country for Old Men Jericho got the idea to base his new heel persona off of Anton, he explains this by saying;

"The guy was completely committed to what he was doing. You could say he was evil and wrong, but in his mind, he was right and that's all there was to it. He was very calm, cool and collected, and a complete psycho as well."



Which honestly describes his current character pretty well. He made the transition for film to wrestling flawlessly and thoughts about his old heel persona are almost a thing of the past.


For those unaware Jericho would play a cocky larger than life rockstar who was sarcastic and always making fun of someone.


It's great to see him ditching something that he knows clearly worked in the past but he didn't want to rehash it. I'm a huge Jericho fan (both for his ring work and his outside interest) and this more or less makes it concrete for me that he gets its. 


A large problem with heels in the wrestling business today is that even though they're a bad guy they all want to be cheered and be that "cool" bad guy just like Stone Cold was about ten years ago

Which...was ten years ago.

Shit changes and they should to. I love watching Randy Orton wrestle but his character is flatter than an 8th grader. Just like anything else you view on a consistent basis, the product needs to change or else it gets stale awfully quick.

Jericho gets that and transitioned not only his in-ring character, but also his ring psychology as well, which impresses me even more.


I wish more wrestlers would attempt the same thing, or the writers would let them. It would spice things up a lot

The Attitude era worked so well because everyone has a different character. It made things interesting. I always hated Goldberg because he was just a big jacked boring white guy. Batista is the same thing however hispanic instead of white.

The only other person I put in Jericho's league in the company right now is Edge for his psychotic on-edge (no pun intended) heel that was almost like the Joker in The Dark Knight in the weeks leading up to his Hell in a Cell match with the Undertaker at Summer Slam last year.


Always amazes me to see how one medium influences another. Crazy connected world we live in.

I'm sorry

No really I am


I never updated this throughout my vacation

 

BUT!!! I have an excuse, seriously...












Happy 2009 by the way.....








Ok right now I'm just playing quasi-damage control and I'll elaborate later (maybe) but I spent my final week of 2008 playing video games and being drunk

Both I assure you were an amazing good time


All and all I want to get back on track with this so sometime this week I'm going to post in this again hopefully with better things than this

It's been about a week since I've updated you dear blog. Even longer since I've had something intelligent to say.



Where have I been?




Mainly playing video games. I'm happy to say that I'm on my Christmas break. I was able to pound out the last two weeks of school and damn does it feel good to be out for a while. It wasn't hell, but it took a lot of endurance to put up with my education. The last thing I wanted to do was come home and think even more or worse, spew worthless shit onto my little slice of the interweb in an attempt to fill up the void.

I care that much


So instead of contributing something to this community I took a trip on the Sæcular side of the Anathem (Pick up this book now) and let my brain rot on Xbox Live for fourteen days. I spent more time as LionTamerV than I should have. To be more specific I ranked up twice in Halo 3, hit Master ranking in Virtua Fighter 5 (I'm the only American playing this game), spent $15.00 on Super Street Fighter 2 Turbo HD Remix which is pretty much paying 15 bucks to scream every time I get destroyed by Johnny Japan, or some assclown using Akuma and doing nothing but shooting overpowered Hadokens, and started playing Assassin's Creed which is so relaxing to play and beautiful to look at I often forget it's a video game.

I rather enjoyed doing nothing but playing video games. If anyone is still mad at my lack of updates my last pitiful excuse is that I don't play video games nearly as much as I used to and I miss that very much. In fact, this Christmas will mark the ten year aniversary of what I consider the day I became a "gamer", for it was Christmas of 1998 that I got the game that changed my life, and was and still is to this day my favorite game of all time, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time for the Nintendo 64.

I credit that grey cartridge for making me a "gamer". To be fair I was playing video games before I made my first step (my brother says I was disturbingly good at Duck Hunt as an infant), but Zelda was the game that turned video games into my hobby and made me appriciate them more. Honestly the game will probably be discussed later in my vacation as I plan on playing it again during the week.

You may have noticed I keep putting the word gamer in quotes (except there oddly enough). I hate that word (along with the word punk), maybe not as much as I hate the word punk, but damnit it's awfully close. I hate it simply because people use it to falsely advertise themselves. Try as you may you're not a gamer simply because you play Tetris on your phone while you shit, or play nothing but Call of Duty. The feeling I have towards that word goes side by side with people who say "music is my life" on their MySpace.

Because we're on the subject of "gamers" I'll bring up something that never fails to piss me off; Elitism. I'll throw it out there that there may not be another concept I hate more than elitism. It exists in any hobby, area, nook, and craney of any society, and we're all guilty of it in one way or another. I would be lying to say I don't become an elitist at times. I'm no saint and I'll admit that. The thought that I'm being one makes me cringe so I try and avoid it at all costs.

There's a huge pantheon of elitists out there. I brushed up on Hipsters earlier, and I'm sure everyone knows how bad music gets with elitsm, but tonight I'm focusing on the elitism in the gaming industry.


 

Video games are similar to music in this great debate, as both have their elitists separated by mere genre. No matter which genre you put yourself in the thought is universally the same; Genre X is better than Genre Y and anyone playing Genre Y sucks monkey dick. It does get a little more in depth with format conflicts (Console vs. PC) and even border disputes (American vs. Japanese) than maybe music would.

Take the First Person Shooter fan. Lets say for the sake of time his game of choice is Halo 3. He'll say that it's a game that takes hours of practice, sharp reflexes, and an overall skill that can't be found in a Role Playing Game and by those players. The RPG gamer will counter that by saying a FPS is barbarically easy and contrains no skill but an itchy trigger finger. To them an RPG is about depth, grandour stories, and tactical gameplay that requires one to think. Obviously both have their strong and weak points. The most striking point about this is that Gamer X does nothing but point out the flaws in Genre Y without thinking about Genre X's flaws. He'll then claim superiority over Genre Y and Gamer Y. Both parties do this creating a sort of video game bourgeois. This can be applied to any genre battle, I'm just using FPS and RPGs as the example because it's something I've encountered my entire life. I personally happen to enjoy both.

PC gamers will often put themselves above console gamers simply because a PC is a superior piece of hardware. A PC will offer sharper graphics, and the ability to easily patch and modify your games (this factor has been almost negated with the online capabilities on colsoles). A console is a piece of hardware with no way of upgrading therefor it becomes obsolete quick. Only recently has a console been able to recieve software updates via the internet, and although the gaming industry experimented with console add-ons throughout the 90's(Sega 32X, Sega CD, Jaguar CD, Nintendo's disk drive for the N64, and Super Nintendo's online Satellaview), these all failed and were unheard of by the time the industry entered the 6th generation. A PC has options to alter, modify, and upgrade it giving it the ability to make little progressions every six months rather than the console who makes a big leap every six years. Your personal computer is like water, able to change it's shape and alter at will while your console pretty much a rock, as in that shit ain't changing anytime soon. This is a case where hardware differences determine gamer superiority rather than a specific game or genre.

The final big area for gaming elitists may be the one that bothers me the most. It's fundamentally rooted in nationalism rather than any real gripe about game quality. Some American gamers will tend to think higher of themselves over those who play Japanese games and vice versa. This conflict sort of goes back to the entry I made earlier on Anime, which is a shame because here people miss out on great games from both sides.

While the United States is credited for inventing the video games (Thank you Ralph Baer) it is Japan who is credited for saving the industry after the crash of 1983. The little Jesus of gaming was Nintendo's Nintendo Entertainment System (or Famicom in Japan). With a Japanese companies like Nintendo and later Sega having hardware dominance many American developers switched to the PC which would explain why most of you fondest 8, 16, and 32 bit games happen to come from the land of the rising sun. Most of the developers making games for consoles just so happen to be from Japan. This trend continued until 2001 when an American console finally became a competitor. Microsoft's Xbox made the step in planting U.S. roots back into the console market, and while they didn't win the first round (That went to Sony's Playstation 2) they have quickly taken top spot with most gamers as the Xbox 360 is arguably the most popular console right now. Granted the Wii has sold more and was more acclaimed when it came out, but good Wii games are few and far between so most of the glory will go to Microsoft this generation.

With the Xbox 360 taking prominence it marked a huge shift in the powers that be in game developers. American game makers has experienced a surge in business and in critical acclaim, making games that have progressed the value of gameplay, but also as games as a piece of art. All of this started around 2005 which not coincidentally was when the Japanese gaming industry reported huge losses and has entered a slump that they haven't been able to recover from. It is my personal opinion that the reason behind this is because of the Japanese gaming industries trend of lack of innovation over the last few years, a tired formula for games, and lack of commitment to online gameplay which has revolutionized the entire industry tenfold.

It's also worth noting that developers tend to make games that suit their homeland. As Americans we like to shoot shit and throw the pigskin around which is why Epic Games makes Gears of War and EA Tiburon makes Madden. The Japanese still believe strongly in Bushido concepts so Capcom will make Street Fighter and still take gaming as a family idea which explains why Mario and Link haven't started beating hookers up yet.

I get pissed off when someone will tell me Mortal Kombat is a better game than that Japanese Virtua Fighter crap, or when you say I want a racing sim so I'm going to pick Need For Speed over Gran Turismo because the Japanese don't know racing (which I'll tell you is flat out bullshit).









I feel like Dennis Miller now because I feel like all I did there was rant, but I feel it was for a purpose. I get tired of hear shit about RPGs from one group and FPSs from another. Play both, it shouldn't be the genre that turns you off rather the quality of the actual game. 

On a side note I titled the article trying to name the ghosts from Pac-Man. I found out after writing this entry that the last ghost isn't named Kinky or even Stinky, but rather Clyde.

Huh, who knew.
 

In the mean time if you're curious about what I've been reading go read Grief Digestion Theater. They're doing a year end bonanza of the best (maybe the worst as well). They're good friends of mine and write good shit.


If that doesn't interest you and gross injuries do, check out this MMA match from the Ultimate Finale 8 this past Wednesday. This gem wasn't on TV because is was an undercard fight. The guy to look at here is Cory Hill who suffers an injury that brings thoughts of Joe Theisman or Sid Vicious (the wrestler not the punk rock icon). That little splendor cam be found here.

I feel as if I should hold everyone over until i can get my ass back on here again so there ya go.

Enjoy

Another example would be Master Chief from the Halo franchise. On the surface Chief is just an emotionless cyborg killer out to save the world from an unstoppable alien force. It's an archetype that can easily be found in any Hollywood blockbuster from the past two and a half decades. However, if you take a step back from Master Chief you'll see how he can represent man's need for technology, or rather our dependency on it. Master Chief isn't an automaton, he's a human (simply John, later Spartan John 117). The man, taken from the age of six is sent to a military training planet to become the ultimate soldier. As a boy he becomes mentally disconnected, only responding to orders, and with a 'mission accomplished' as his only concern. John loses his humanity from an early age become a military shell. He's then later augmented with biotic limbs and reflex enhancing chemicals, throw on a spiffy pair of armor, and you have the Master Chief. An android who has lost his humanity for the sake of humanity. While not physically dead, he is a perfect example of killing one to save many. John, like Arnold Schwarzenegger in the Terminator, is tech incarnate. Something to be feared, but as Arnold is in Terminator 2, tech that saves everyone.
 

These are the things I look into when I see a piece of fiction

Then I get to pro wrestling



Professional wrestling (specifically American wrestling) doesn't really take a genius to figure out. Sometimes I think that's why so many people hate it. They think they're more complex than wrestling. At it's core pro wrestling capitalizes on hate. You get someone in a ring who can generate so much hate in people that they pretty much work themselves up into a frenzy and will wait for any Joe Sixpack to beat them. Any good babyface (good guy) in wrestling is only as good as the heels (bad guys) he beats.

Pro wrestling is something that took me a while to understand. Granted I started watching it at the age of 8 and I started watching it during it's greatest boom period in history, but I learned a lot after that era died off, most of it I learned from wrestling now, but some of it I gathered from the boom era and even as far as the 1950's and 70's. Tonight I'll lay the framework for it. The best way I can put it is that wrestling is 90% mental and 10% physical. To generate the best response to any given match there takes a certain amount of patience as well as psychology, with a hint of athletic ability.

The very first part to making wrestling work is patience. Knowing when to capitalize on something is crucial for all business, but knowing when to let something sit and wait for it to boil, ahh now that takes a stronger patience. The boxing promoter does this without flaw, selling a fight for weeks, even months at a time, letting both fighters talk shit to create tension, but most importantly never letting those fighters touch. The second tension erupts you've lost it all because the buyer has gotten what they've been waiting for, the violence. The more you let two opponents touch another the more you're going to have to build up that tension again. If you don't believe me look at the Oscar De La Hoya vs Manny Pacquiao which is the top grossing Pay Per View ever (surpassing former top Wrestlemania 23). Wrestling gets to push the limits of patience because unlike real boxing where trash talking really hits a certain max (unless...you know..."it's personal") pro wrestling is completely staged so even more tension can be built with promos saying anything desired (because....you know...its NOT personal). Patience creates the powdered keg that when the match finally happens will be ready to explode via the next element which happens to be...

Psychology. I've always compared good professional wrestling to good theater. I'm sure there are some people who just click back on their browser now, and even more who are yelling at me, but both take an extreme level of suspension of disbelief which can only be obtained through superior acting. If you've seen a shitty play you know this because you know it's a play. Good theater causes you to forget what's going on in front of you isn't real. It's escapist entertainment (pretty much everything is). Wrestling is just a more oiled up, muscular, physical representation of that. We all know wrestling isn't real. It's all staged and choreographed, but if the psychology is there you'll forget about that.

Wrestling psychology depends on two different things. One is the match type. The match type acts as a set piece to what happens in the ring. The match types, normal, hardcore (and its many deviations), etc... establish a given pace in a match that the performers must equal. The backdrop here also distorts realism and adds or diminishes endurance to the performance. The example I'll give here is that when someone is hit with a steel chair in a normal match it usually ends the match via knocking them out flat on their ass. Take that same chairshot in a No Disqualification match and that same person can be hit with that chair 20 times and still kick out at two. It doesn't make any sense when you think about it, but its the psychology of the setting, which in this case is the ring and type of match.

The psychology between two wrestlers is where things get interesting. What two wrestlers inside a ring do through out the course of a match should all depend on the crowd. A good wrestler bases what they do off of the emotions of the group. A good match becomes a 20 minute roller coaster. There's a build up (coaster rising) then when you least expect it all comes crashing down in a flurry of moves. As this progresses and a crowd's emotion builds the two wrestlers will use even more spectacular moves to get an even bigger reaction. I can only imagine it's like switching from pot to heroin every night. This'll will go on until the crowd can't take any more and the finisher sequence is performed, ending the match.

The physical part of the equation is simple. The more athletic you are the more, better, stronger looking, acrobatic, amazing, etc... moves you can do thus giving people more variety in their match. This isn't really needed as using the above concepts. Anyone no matter what they look like can become a great wrestler using the above factors. It you think physique matters look at the Ric Flair / Harley Race feuds of the 70's and 80's. Arguably some of the best matches of all time and not because of their athletic prowess, it's because they had patience and knew how to read a crowd of people. It's more like the whip cream on an already good pie.

Granted this is what makes a good wrestling match I'm not saying you'll find this in every match you see, if you did that would be amazing. These elements tend to be found more frequently in wrestling in Mexico and Japan.

That's it for part one. Next time I'll detail the most amazing part of wrestling, the heels.