Well, it has certainly been a momentous semester from my point of view, both for the significant developments in my personal life (i.e. becoming a father) and for the professional significance of my first semester as an assistant professor. As such, it's hard to sum it all up into a closing comment that encapsulates it all. We covered a lot of material, and you all brought a lot in that I hadn't anticipated but that enriched our conversations.
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I don't know how many people will still keep checking the blogs here but my sister sent me a great link to find authors. Literature-Map takes an author and finds other authors that are similar in writing, genre, theme and has fast become the knew way I'm looking out for new books to read. Some of the names that pop up are a bit odd (when I typed in Stephen King the closest to him was J.R. Tolkien and way out in left field was Jane Austen and William Shakespeare)but otherwise I think it's a great find.
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A random post as I wrap up my final paper...

Originally I was going to cover multiple types of fanfiction, but had to narrow that down. However in that stage of looking up fanfiction genres, I ran across Tetris fanfiction.

http://www.fanfiction.net/game/Tetris/

Now what I've read so far is not that great, but I thought it was interesting that people decided to write fanfiction about this particular game. We mentionged Tetris a while back and i never posted it, but... If you get bored, take a look. It can become quite amusing.

The pictures from the "I found a camera in the woods" were more than just a bit eerie. As I scrolled through them I had a feeling that the further I scrolled down the more chances something scary was going to pop up. Well, nothing popped up persay but I did see something vaguely human-shaped in the fog some times. The fifth picture from the top sports the outline of some humanoid shape near the lower right amongst the tree-line. At first I didn't catch it but with a second glance I saw it and it made me jump. After that I scrutinized each photo, looking for another shape.
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Fresh on the heels of our discussing game, game, game and again game, Jason Nelson has released another work in a similar style. i made this. you play this. we are enemies appears to have some similar things going on, but I'm intrigued by the sense in which we as players/readers/critics/students are the game designer's "enemies." The comment in direction number 4, "stop trying to 'get it'" seems particularly targeted toward or relevant to our discussion of the game, especially since I made sure to set the game up by asking you to try and "get it" instead of "just" playing it.

So what do you think we should do with this? On the one hand, its energy seems somewhat more focused on playing with / mashing up specific online spaces, but I don't want to be a "shark with bees for hair" for saying so. Do you?

The first game I played was "Adventure." This game was extremely difficult for me. Once I learned how to kill the duck (and at this i was shocked - was it even a duck?), but the game at first seemed very simple. This simplicity must have come from the simple "look" of the game; the main character, who you were, was a tiny green dot, or whatever color dot you were. I understood the goal of the game was to unlock the gates with the keys (their color coordinating). I played this game, many times, but never got past the second gate.
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I played both "Game, game, game and again game" and "McVideogame". They both had messages in them, almost like subliminal messages. In McVideogame, I played as the farmer and had to grow my crops and beef cows for my McDonald's store. Some of my cows got sick and I had to hire only a few workers because the first time I played I was bankrupt in a minute. The second time I lasted more seasons but then at once my cows became deseased and I had to kill them all. There were messags that popped up every so often like "AntiGlobalization" and "Pollution" ones.
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McVideogame
I don't know if anyone else did or not but I took the time and went through the tutorial and before I even started the game I just felt absolutely horrible the more and more I read. The game fools you with its bright colors and cartoon-like characters but when you start reading the instructions and the bitterly sarcastic humor behind what it's saying... well I didn't want to play at all.
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Game, game, game left the largest impression on me in that it reminded me of a director that I love very much, Wes Anderson. He's done such gems as The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou and The Royal Tenenbaums. Game, game, game also reminded me of the movie The Science of Sleep directed by Michel Gondry.
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Well, two out of three of these games were depressing. Three out of three were at times, frustrating. But overall, there was enjoyment. Especially at the end of game, etc, when the narrator/author/designer said "There was only one single capsule left. He and his friend Charlie..."
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"Game, game, game, and again game" was as far from being a any type of game I would normally play for entertainment purposes, but we were given fair warning that the purpose of this wasn't for fun. So, as I went through the 13 levels of scribbled lines, flashing objects, and random text, I tried hard to pick up the hidden meaning behind this game.
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It strikes me as odd to think about Facade as an actual dramatic piece. What makes me feel a bit anxious about it as a whole is the fact that if we consider its production as a text that we read (text in the literary sense), the text is fluid and depends upon our interpretation of it. Facade itself doe snot exist independent of our reading it but rahter is depednet upon us to make it complete.
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While playing Game, game, game and again game, all I could focus on were the mind-reeling messages the game was exposing. Several times, as I moved quickly across the screen, I caught several key words being flashed involving life happiness or the true values of mankind. One level was devoted completely to capitalism and man's intricate design of economy. As I moved up the stairway, bumping into dollar signs, I gained wealth and power. Then, at the very top, text appeared informing me I was 'wealthy'. As I descended from the top stair, I hit a corner, the lowest avaiable point on the screen.
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I too tried out McVideogame over break. I tend to not really excel in games akin to SimCity without a cheat. And since this game didn't have a cheat, corporate fired me several times for bankrupting the company. All I have to say is "I didn't want the job anyway, McDonalds!"

Truth is this videogame is kind of a force to be reckoned with. I mean the subject matter is intense even if it comes off as a bit sarcastic and passive aggressive, it's what I would think to be a very economically and socially accurate representation of the production tank that is McDonalds.
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I tried to run with McDonald's corporation with some success, but what caught my interest was reading the explanation for the creation of this game. Under the "Why This Game?" tab, I read Ronald's attempt to explain the faults of the McDonald's chain. As stated in the letter, to deny the accusations against McDonald's negative impact is pointless, but is a game detailing how this notable restaurant impacts our world helping the case against McDonald's? Sure running a successful business has it's costs, but experiencing the "necessity" through this game didn't make it seem any better to me.
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Over the break I tried out the McDonald's Video game, and found it somewhat difficult. Even after reading the tutorial I still had some trouble getting my bearings. But I did find the game very interesting for several reasons.
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It has a strange effect on the brain, I think... The staggering legend from spuds to frozen space capsules as an ending says alot, and almost none of the entirety of the game has coherency. Yet somehow given the movement of the sooted sprite/ball to our control leaves us feeling like we are there, if only to get through to the bittersweet chocolate chip end.
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http://www.simmphonic.com/programming/adventure.htm
...is a link I used to play the Atari 2600 game "Adventure". It took a few tries to get the hang of moving around the dragons, especially the green one, who seemed too fast to avoid while trying to seize upon another key. Then as my title suggests, I found that the spear that matched the color of the first dragon would slay any of them regardless of their speed. Is it possible that when Scott Pehnke "recreated" the game he left out some elements, such as the bat moving items at random?
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I played Facade four times and the results I got were very different. For my first try, I played a female character named Rachel. I didn't really know what to do when Trip asked me to come inside. I didn't read the directions. I tried to tell him, I couldn't move, he got very mad and kicked me out (even though I was already outside). He didn't listen to what I had to say. The second time I played, I remained as Rachel, except I knew to use the arrow keys in order to move. Trip and Grace were arguing, but they tried to hide it from me.
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