Homestuck Notifier - Spades Slick

 If you've been following me on Tumblr, you know that lately I've gotten interested in a webcomic called Homestuck. It's made up to feel like an old school text-based video game, and it incorporates a lot of audio, flash animation, and even a few flash mini-games (making it a sort of multi-media webcomic). I wont bother trying to summarize the plot, as it's a bit complicated, but it's a really intriguing storyline and I'm hooked.

The comic updates regularly, generally on a daily basis, so sometimes fans have to constantly check the site to see if there's a new page. Luckily, one such fan developed a program called the Homestuck Notifier, which checks the Homestuck RSS feed regularly, and when there's a new update, a sound will play and an image will pop up above the computer's taskbar.

The Notifier cycles through a bunch of preset fanart, but the READ ME explained that you could upload your own image or sound to the program's macro folder. Obviously I had to do this, because the preset images didn't include one of Spades Slick, one of my favorite characters.

Re: Your Brains Flash Essay

A week ago one of my English teachers gave an assignment - and I'm cutting that sentence of here to explain that, yes, I have to English teachers I mean professors (man, so many things to remember in college). One of these professors I've had before, so I'll call him Professor One, but this is my first semester with this other professor, so I'll call him Professor Two.

Last week Professor Two assigned everyone to bring in the lyrics to a song we really liked. We're working on a poetry unit, and the idea was to look at the lyrics without the music, and critique it as a poem.

We were to bring in those lyrics at our next class on Thursday, and I spent the rest of Tuesday trying to think of an appropriate song, then most of Wednesday trying to convince myself not to use Johnathan Coulton's 'Re: Your Brains.'

If you haven't heard this song before, click here to listen to it on Youtube. Johnathan Coulton is a relatively well known comedic musician on the internet, and this song is probably his most famous.

I finally did bring in the lyrics to this song on Thursday, and we were asked to write a short 'flash essay' on the lyrics. I think Professor Two thought our songs would have a more serious tone, so I had a bit of difficulty writing about this one, especially since it's a simple narrative with no complex imagery to explain. A friend of mine asked that I let her read what I wrote, so I'm posting it here; remember, it's not that great, as I wrote it in only a few minutes, and for the most part it's unfinished.


Johnathan Coulton's song "Re: Your Brains" is a straightforward narrative about a zombie attack, told through the eyes of a zombi-fied office worker, politely asking a friend to come out of hiding so the zombie horde can get his brain. The song is meant to be satirical, suggesting that Bob, the narrator, is not the stereotypical mindless zombie.

The first few lines of the song really set the tone. It starts "Heya Tom, it's Bob, from the office down the hall/Good to see you buddy, how's it been?" At this point, a first time listener would expect something entirely different from the real message of the song. The character Bob is also making himself out to be a gentleman from the beginning, an illusion quickly crushed by the next lines, "Things have been OK for me except that I'm a zombie now/Really wish you'd let us in."

The song continues to try to paint Bob as the caring gentleman, especially in the chorus, which says "We're not unreasonable, I mean, no one's going to eat your eyes/All we want to do is eat your brains/We're at an impasse here, maybe we could compromise." The song achieves a wonderful hilarity by being straight-forward and sincere, ignoring the dark implications of the setting.


That's all I wrote in class, and unfortunately Professor Two didn't read the essays -though there's a chance he will later in the semester. If he does, I'll polish up my writing and try to obtain the same satirical tone Coulton wrote with (and, of course, share it with you all here).

Week One with Skyward Sword

I don't think I'm going to be blogging this entire game, but I definitely wanted to give you all my week one reactions, especially since, a) I've been waiting and saving over two years for this game, and b) I know quite a few people who haven't been able to play it yet, and have been asking me what I think. This'll be long, and I apologize in advance - but there are many pretty pictures to look at!

NaNoWriMo Music

One thing I like to do while I write is listen to good mood-setting music. This means something different depending on what I'm writing, but it helps me get into the feel of what I'm writing, and if others are home at the time, it helps block out whatever noise they're making.

My first year of NaNoWriMo, I listened almost exclusively to a Japanese band called Plastic Tree. Listening to English lyrics, I'd found, really distracted me (if I knew the song, I wanted to sing along, and if I didn't, I wanted to find out what the song was about, and either way lyrics always ended up in my writing), and since I was really into Japanese modern culture at the time, I found the Plastic Tree songs very helpful.

My novel in '08 was a period piece called Princess Kate about a king's daughter who was slowly discovering that she had a multiple personality disorder (the actual name for the condition is Dissociative Identity Disorder - DID - and that's where I got the URL for my blogs). Plastic Tree's music matched the tone of my novel because most of their recent stuff was softer, with a melancholic sound with some occasional heavier rock influences.

Shadow of the Colossus

If you've been paying attention to anything I've been writing, then you may remember that I like stories. All kinds of stories - deep and meaningful, or light and fun; fantasy, sci-fi, or realistic; stories from books, graphic novels, TV shows, movies, and yes, even video games.

Because sometimes, in my opinion, video games can have the best stories. Sure, there are your silly arcade games and pointless shooters or beat 'em ups, but for every handful of those, there's at least one game with a truly captivating story. One of the greatest gems of literary fiction that I've ever seen happens to be the video game Shadow of the Colossus.

Treadmill Reviews: Gankutsuou, The Count of Monte Cristo

I've been trying my hardest to keep up with my daily treadmill exercise, but it's been getting difficult to find new things to watch while I walk. I had a haphazard list of shows and anime I wanted to go through, and after much deliberation, a couple weeks ago I finally decided on Gankutsuou: The Count of Monte Cristo.

Zelda's 25th

Look at that - I'm talking about video games again. Oh well.

I mentioned this in my E3 Coverage post, but this year marks Zelda's 25th Anniversary, 25 years since the first Zelda game was released in Japan by Nintendo. This is pretty exciting for me, as The Legend of Zelda is one of my favorite fiction series of all time.

Tumblr and TV Intros

A couple short things today.

First, I signed up with Tumblr (here's a link to my page there), after much insistence from friends of mine who use the site. Actually, I did this back in July, before I left on my summer vacation. I intended to write an introductory post back then, but I totally forgot about it until just recently.

In all honesty, I still don't really 'get' Tumblr. It's a micro-blogging service, which means it's like a mix of Facebook, Twitter, and Blogger all rolled in one. Most people, it appears, just post funny pictures or gifs that they want to share with friends, which is cute but not enough to make me join up. There are a lot of people who do post short written pieces, however, so it seems like that's what I'll be doing.

Treadmill Reviews: Fullmetal Alchemist

Walking on a treadmill, if you've never done it before, is actually quite boring. We happen to have one in my house, and it's become one of the few ways I can get exercise reliably, but the only way I can stand to use it is if I sit a laptop on the top tray and watch TV shows. And of course, when I watch something interesting, I want to tell you guys about it.

The show that I've been watching these last few weeks is the newest anime adaptation of a very popular Japanese manga, Fullmetal Alchemist. I read the books years back when I was in high school, and I didn't mind going through the story again in anime format because I already knew that the entire thing was and would be incredible.

Avast! These be Strange Waters!

 Aye, and they'd have to be, too; today's tide bring in one of the best holidays ever: International Talk like a Pirate Day! That's right, landlubbers, ye heard it here. It's the one day a year dedicated to the fierce, rogue, sea-loving pirates, when everyone around the world can affect an accent and dress up for school or work (assuming, of course, you've explained yourself to your captain).

I'm pretty bad at Piratey lingo, so I wont even pretend to try to keep it up for long.

Wake Up Juice

Getting ready for the school year to start became official last Sunday, when I turned on my phone's morning alarm tone. The particular tone I use has gone through some changes in the past year, and since I'm doing my 'back to school' special, I wanted to highlight a few of them.

When I started school last year, I didn't have a phone, so I woke up using my favorite little Bob alarm clock. I got it years ago from Brookstone, after seeing a friend use it at summer camp, and I always thought it was super cute. Unfortunately, it emits a sharp, repetitious beep in its attempt to wake me up, and listening to that day after day, year after year, was grating my nerves.

Vacation Time: Results Show

Monday, August the first, my parents and I set out for our official summer-vacation-get-away thing. The goal, I believe, was to visit my brother in Utah, see a few people in Idaho, and get to know said-brother's future in-laws in Oregon while we scouted out places to eat in Portland for the upcoming wedding. My own personal goals, meanwhile, were to work through some of my 'to-read' backlog, figure out our new car radio, and drive at least one leg of the trip without mom yelling at me (she's a very nervous passenger).

The drive to Utah took about ten hours, and I drove the first three. The road goes straight through the Mojave Desert, which is relatively pleasant to look at but pretty boring to drive through. Add that to the fact that I didn't know where I was going, and I was kinda stressed (I'm not used to using the overdrive button, so there were a few people riding my tail, and mom was finicky throughout), and by the end of my shift my back was sore and I was ready to stop.

Like this, but with no clouds. Ever.

The Guild: Game on!

The Guild returns next Tuesday for a fifth season! I'm super excited!

I know I've mentioned The Guild before, briefly, on previous blogs, but I doubt many of you really know much about it. The Guild is the name of a web series, started in 2007 by a small-time actress, Felicia Day. Tired of auditioning for small roles and getting very few calls back, and avidly addicted to Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games (MMOs), Felicia decided to write her own television sitcom based on her experiences. She produced the show online with a few friends in the business, using her own contacts, their own equipment, and their own money.

Escala

A couple years ago, a certain car company ran an ad for their newest line, using an orchestral piece that seemed unnecessarily epic. I can't find the video online, otherwise I would link you to it, but I remember the music from that commercial. A friend of mine found the track and downloaded it onto her iPod, because it truly was amazing.

Sometime later, one of my brothers took me and our mom out in his car, and in his car stereo he had a CD of music by the all-female string quartet named Escala. I only realized sometime later, after my brother bought our mom the CD because we both loved it so much, that it was their signature piece 'Palladio' that I'd first heard in that car commercial.

Musical Update

I've never been extremely good with musical instruments, though in saying that I'm of course comparing myself to my youngest brother, who could pick up almost anything and master it in a few practice sessions (He played the flute in middle school, and the quad-tenor drums, the glockenspiel, the oboe, and a few others in high school).

I took Clarinet lessons in 5th and 6th grade, when my local middle school had a program that allowed 5th graders to take Beginner Band lessons first period, before the Elementary school started. I was pretty good at it, but in 7th grade I moved to a school closer to where I lived, and their band program was famously the worst in our district, so stopped practicing clarinet. I still have my clarinet, and with a bit of practice I'm sure I could play it, but what I really gained taking that band class was an understanding of music theory. I can read the music staff (though it takes me a moment to translate), and I understand sharps, flats, time signatures, and scales pretty well.

I don't quite remember where it came from, but we've also had a piano in my house since I was in elementary school (I think it was a gift from someone who was moving and couldn't take it with them). Before taking my band classes, I had no idea how to play it, except for a basic C major, since anyone can find C on the piano. After taking the class, it still took me a while to find which keys corresponded to which notes, but with a better understanding of the music I could figure things out.

Recently - in the past year or so - I've been picking up piano practice again. Not conventionally, as I dislike playing the piano, or any instrument, where others can hear me, but when I have the house to myself I'll tinker out whatever I have. If we're practicing a song in church, I'll play my part so I can get it down better, and lately I've been printing out video game sheet music. I have to admit, I'm sounding pretty good.

At least with things I've practiced. It still might take me an hour to get a flow for something I've never played before, and that's not even considering the bottom hand. It takes a lot of concentration, or skill, or practice, or whatever, to get the bottom hand on the piano working. We never learned bass clef in band class (Well, some of the other instruments did, but us clarinets never learned it). Combine that with the fact that, once I've figured out what I'm playing, I have to play two different chords at different times on different locations on the keyboard.

I've got the bottom hand accompaniment figured out for a few of the video game songs I'm practicing, but I'm not exaggerating when I say all of the notes are next to each other, in order, repetitively. If it gets much more complicated than that, I start to lose it.

I am proud of what I've taught myself, however - it sounds like a real song! - so I don't mind playing it when my parents are home anymore, and even at church, on the new electric keyboard we have in the Young Women's room. Unfortunately, this gives people the impression that I actually know what I'm doing, so when my mom suggested they make me play the music for the opening song, the Young Women's leaders happily agreed.

So now they're making me learn a song out of the hymnbook to play in two weeks. Because I've got enough time on my hands to figure out another set of bottom-hand notes.

I'm happy that I have the musical training that I do - I can sing Alto now while a few others who purport to be more musically inclined can not, and I can lead the music as well. I'm a bit annoyed on this fact - leading music is really easy, yet I seem to be one of only a few who can in my youth group, and possibly the only one who can do more complicated time signatures like 2/2 or 6/4. I volunteered to attempt to teach everyone else, though I'm not sure how willing or how easily they'll learn. But actually playing music, while fun and endorphin-releasing, is really only a pastime for me.


(Because you truly care, these are the songs I've learned:
Pokemon Route Theme: Piano (Simplified, no chords)
Majora's Mask Clock Town: Piano
Zelda 1 Dungeon Theme: Piano (Simplified, still working on bottom hand)
Monkey Island Scumm Bar: Piano (Simplified, bass clef only on ending)
I'm also attempting the Wind Waker Ocean Theme (Piano, tho' my sheet music is different), but I'm having trouble with the bottom hand, and the chords during the second part. Especially hard since this song is supposed to be a call-and-repeat, and you can't call-and-repeat with one instrument.

The Sound of Gaming

I've been getting into a Video Game mood lately, so I felt I should blog about it. I wont go into everything on my mind - that'd take way too long - but I will dive a bit into one facet of video gaming - music.

Every now and then, people will ask me what my favorite type of music is. This is an awkward question for me, because I honestly don't listen to music that much. I imagine once I start driving myself everywhere and audio is the only form of entertainment on the road, I will listen to more songs, but for now the only type of music I find myself listening to is instrumental; lyrics confuse me when I'm trying to write, which happens to be one of the few times I listen to music.

After having experience with NaNoWriMo and realizing that I needed some music playing while I wrote, I went on a hunt to find good instrumental music. Ultimately, I settled on the music from video games. Movie and television scores are also a great help, but video game soundtracks have become the most common sounds I listen to, not just while writing.

What most people love about the music they listen to is the shared emotion with the singer. I'm just a bit critical of this, as one singer's emotion can't be shared with everyone, and even the singer wont be feeling that emotion forever. Also, any music commercially purposed (instrumental or lyrical) is designed to bring about emotions, which seems to me to automatically negate the sincerity behind the piece. I still like lyrical music, but video game music is different from all other forms of music. Yes, the composer of the music is attempting to draw a specific emotion out of you, but as a gamer, the listener creates part of the emotion within themselves, without someone else forcing it in.

People who aren't gamers or haven't played a certain game wont be able to ingest the same emotion as people who have played the game. The emotion is a response to the memory of the game itself, and most songs play multiple times in any given game. In movie scores, a certain song generally only plays during one point in the movie, so the emotion is associated with that particular scene, but with video game music, the emotion comes from all our triumphs or failures or moments during the game where we felt a certain way. If you haven't played the game, you haven't felt those emotions in context.

Video game music is also, I believe, more personal. For example, think of any lyrical music that presents loss or hopelessness as the emotion. It's not a very fun emotion, so I don't know why people specifically listen to it, but I know it's out there. For a movie example, there's the score from Cast Away, or the track "...To Die For" from Lion King. The songs are sad, and understandably people tear up, but I suspect that the emotion gamers feel listening to the music from Shadow of the Colossus is more real, not because the scene is more dramatic, but because, instead of the tragic moment happening to a lonely post worker or African lion, the tragedy happens to us, personally, playing the role of the in-game character.

The most common emotion in video game music, however, is power and awe. Most overworld music is hopeful, instilling in the gamer an adventurous feeling that they can defeat whatever evils they come across, or just plain happy and fun. There's a lot of peaceful music, placed to make the gamers feel accomplished and satisfied. Of course there's the battle music, which either plays when you enter a turn-based battle or when there's an enemy nearby, but all music in video games is meant to get the gamer into the mood of the game, no matter what it is.

Of course, only people who have played the game get the correct mood-set out of the piece; even if a score is meant to make you feel shocked or angry, it does a better job in context. That would explain why video game music isn't as popular as it should be. When you think about it, composing video game music is an amazing feat. Most scores need to be able to loop over many times, and a lot of more modern pieces need to be ready to end at any time so the system can shift to a battle track, or back to an overworld track. If the music itself wasn't stunning enough, the skill and effort used to compose music that can conform to game mechanics should blow you away.

Now that most games are fully orchestrated (or, at least narrative games are), the music is gaining popularity. Already, multiple organizations are arranging music for symphonies to play to audiences, and I'm already saving my money for when one shows up in L.A.