Anyone got one? I... for a friend. Not me. And not pink. Not ever. But Animal Crossing - wireless - ability to visit other people's towns... no more boring times on public transport.... oh god, I want one. Is this wrong?
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
No. I want one too.
Posted by jonesy999 (Member # 5) on :
Did you find your missing electricity Benway?
[ 15.12.2005, 09:02: Message edited by: jonesy999 ]
Posted by MiscellaneousFiles (Member # 60) on :
I'm tempted by a DS too, but as with all portable games systems, I'm worried that I would have to pay for games. I've heard that they can cost as much as £30! Can anyone suggest a portable games system that would allow me to play pirated games?
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
What happens in Nintendogs?
Posted by Kira (Member # 826) on :
quote:Originally posted by London: What happens in Nintendogs?
I could be wrong, but I thought Nintendogs are just glorified tamagotchis?
You know,
feed the puppy, walk the puppy, train the puppy, watch the puppy die, because you couldnt be bothered answering the alarm every hour or something...
Posted by Thorn Davis (Member # 65) on :
quote:Originally posted by Kira: feed the puppy, walk the puppy, train the puppy, watch the puppy die, because you couldnt be bothered.
Argh! Childhood flashba...
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
quote:Originally posted by jonesy999: Did you find your missing electricity Benway?
Yeah. At some point in the night my room was filled light and noise. I slept for TWELVE HOURS last night. I woke up this morning and felt human, for the first time in months. I was even humming/singing in the shower (appropriately, it was "Magical Sound Shower", from the original Outrun arcade machine).
You can pirate DS games. There's Roms on the net, so all you need is a blank catridge and a cable. I know of a man who is doing this to his DS.
Posted by squirrelandgman (Member # 201) on :
can he get me elektroplankton on the cheap?
i also want a buddah machine. anyone know where i can get a buddah machine?
Posted by jonesy999 (Member # 5) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dr. Benway:
quote:Originally posted by jonesy999: Did you find your missing electricity Benway?
Yeah. At some point in the night my room was filled light and noise.
Think yourself lucky you went to bed. Kirsty was going to phone you and invite your round to play candle lit Spiderman Monopoly.
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
was your power out too? It was well spooky on Finsbury Park Road. I went out to buy candles, and with no house lighting or street lighting, and this orange sky, it was like a martian ghost town. Or, it was like a power cut. I would have loved to have played spiderman monopoly As it is, I drank one beer and stared at a candle until I fell asleep.
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
quote:Originally posted by squirrelandgman: can he get me elektroplankton on the cheap?
i also want a buddah machine. anyone know where i can get a buddah machine?
YOU! Didn't you jack in your job and go off on a round-the-world gambling spree? What happened?
Posted by jonesy999 (Member # 5) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dr. Benway: was your power out too? It was well spooky on Finsbury Park Road. I went out to buy candles, and with no house lighting or street lighting, and this orange sky, it was like a martian ghost town. Or, it was like a power cut. I would have loved to have played spiderman monopoly As it is, I drank one beer and stared at a candle until I fell asleep.
Our power was off too, yes. I wasn't there, I was out carefully cultivating today's headache, like some kind of evil pain gardener.
Posted by squirrelandgman (Member # 201) on :
quote:Originally posted by London: YOU! Didn't you jack in your job and go off on a round-the-world gambling spree? What happened?
Hello. Yes, I did that. I think the technical term for what happened is "I done me bollox"
So as well as cheap elektroplankton and a a buddah machine I also need a job.
Anyone got any jobs going? I am currently on the MI5 website looking at their jobs but they insist on using the word 'demanding' which puts me right off.
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
gman reminds me very much of the character called 'Switters' in Tom Robbins' "Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates".
[ 15.12.2005, 09:59: Message edited by: Dr. Benway ]
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
If one had already totally pwned Animal Crossing on the Gaycube, would one want to play the DS version, do you think?
Posted by Toilet Duck (Member # 801) on :
I have a DS. I love it. I have Nintendogs, and two little golden retriever puppies (I'm not allowed a real pet - it's a substitute). It is kind of like a Tamagotchi, but less demanding as you can turn Nintendogs off whenever you like and the puppies don't bleep at you. And they haven't died of neglect yet, just got so dirty that little puffs of grey stuff keep coming off them. I do worry they'll run away and not love me any more though.
I don't have Animal Crossing, but it's certainly on my wish list. I'd be lucky if anyone bought it for me though
Portable games system with serious pirateability? Pants, but N-Gage. Far too easy to acquire all 41 games on a CD.
What are electroplankton and a buddah machine? I feel depressingly unenlightened.
Posted by squirrelandgman (Member # 201) on :
Would love that Buddha Machine exploded diagram on a t-shirt, but WTF is it?
I do covet the DS, but possibly not quite as much as the GB Micro. Yeah I know it's just another GBA, but it's so small it's practically invisible, and it's got those nice retro game&watch lines about it.
Advance Wars etc in properly portable form, Mmmmm Bisto.
Posted by MiscellaneousFiles (Member # 60) on :
quote:Originally posted by Boy Racer: GB Micro. Yeah I know it's just another GBA, but it's so small it's practically invisible...
That's gotta count in its favour.
Posted by Toilet Duck (Member # 801) on :
I want a Micro too. So small it could slip in my pocket to keep me occupied on the train. They even designed it with a replaceable clear front, so that if Mr Duck puts it in his pocket with his keys and scratches the front (like he did with my phone) I can put a nice new shiny front bit on. Great stuff.
Posted by squirrelandgman (Member # 201) on :
no one has any in stock. rough trade are accepting orders though. electroplankton getting us release next year. there is a game called ouendan which looks nice for ds too.
I am looking for a job, honest.
Posted by New Way Of Decay (Member # 106) on :
What colour shall I get? What games to start with? I'm thinking Nintendogs and Sims 2. Do you think that the fact that I've given up playing games at home because they eat up too much time but this you can play on the train or whatevs therefore it's ok because it's 'dead time' anyway is justification enough for such a juvenile, senseless indulgence? (eta I have decided to have the DS instead of a baby you see, so it is ok to continue to be juvenile).
[ 16.12.2005, 07:58: Message edited by: London ]
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
quote:Originally posted by London: is justification enough for such a juvenile, senseless indulgence?
You don't need any justification for indulgence!
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
I'm not down with this summary of gaming. This is like the protestant work ethic in overdrive - even in your spare time (spare time?!?!) you should be striving for betterness, learning, digesting, being active, creating, living etc. Bollocks! Why? Why should you do this? Is there a point where you stop, or do you just keep working until you are dead? Playing computer games can be fun, relaxing, stimulating and inspiring. They aren't evil, and just because you've decided that they are so last year, doesn't mean they are somehow pointless and childish now, London.
For somebody who has written about games in a frikkin book, which is more than most of us who've been playing computer games for over twenty years will ever do, I'm disturbed that you could be so flippant and moralistic about the whole business. Is a DS somehow only semi-gaming or something, because o look, it's being marketed almost directly at the females in the UK?
This attitude has got to stop.
[ 16.12.2005, 08:24: Message edited by: Dr. Benway ]
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
I’m not denying gaming can be fun, stimulating, relaxing and enjoyable. When have I ever said that? But equally nobody can deny that, unless you have the self-control of the Dali Lama, they can eat into your spare time until all you are doing is working at your day job and then working of your night job of running a farm, or killing zombies, or looking after a dog, or whatever you’re choosing to do in the world of the game. And I do not have the self-control of the Dali Lama, or even of a fucking gnat. If there is a pleasure to be had, I will, within reason, indulge myself with it endlessly, until I have achieved nothing of import in the real world. And who else in the real world gives a fuck that I have got a gold medal in every single race in every single mode with every single character? Fucking noone, that’s who. At least, if I get a Nintendo DS, I can indulge my desire to play video games without letting it take over my life. This isn’t some kind of Protestant work ethic – this is simply attempting to control my own disgusting levels of laziness and procrastination before they control me.
Posted by Fionnula the Cooler (Member # 453) on :
LOOK! This is the most exciting thing ever. Now I can play Lucasarts games on the bus! Point and click adventures are bound to be exquisite using the stylus and touch-screen. It is brilliant. Little bit expensive, but BRILLIANT.
Anyone playing Mario Kart online yet? Amazon is taking several millenniums to deliver my wireless usb dongle, but when they do, I will need friends.
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
I want one!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by Fionnula the Cooler (Member # 453) on :
Yes! Me too. But I already have an ugly cheapo silver one. It is astounding how stressful choosing a colour can be. Do I want blue? No, boy + blue = boring. Do I want pink? No way, gay + pink = stereotype. Do I want silver? No, looks like a cheap-shit platinum alarm clock from Argos etc. Red would have been perfect. Never mind. I've read that a smaller, sleeker, hotter, redesigned DS is gonna be released sometime next year, so I shall trade mine then. Fuck waiting.
Posted by jnhoj (Member # 286) on :
I got one. The puzzle games like zookeeper, meteos do nothign for me. Polarium is ok in a kind of back of the newspaper kind of way. I am still playing through advance wars (the sp) version and refuse to touch my copy of the ds version until I've done it. It may never be opened! I want quendaon or my gitaroo man hit on the move. hohoo yes!
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
Advance wars is fucking bullet on the DS. At first it's fun, but now (on level 16 or 17), every move is crucial.. it's less like a strategy game and more like solving a rubiks cube, in that the scope for creativity goes down as you get more and more outgunned. It makes me want to throw my machine at a wall, screaming like a snot nosed kid that it's not fair because I can't attack the pipe runner with my tanks. How many times have a built an artillery unit, only to have it wiped out straight away by a rocket tank hidden inside the fog of war? Or been midway through capturing a building when the enemy magically reduces all my units by two or three hps?
It's very frustrating. Same with Mario Kart. It seems like luck once you move beyond 50cc. I don't think I've got it any more.
Posted by not... (Member # 25) on :
is surpisingly good
Posted by Fionnula the Cooler (Member # 453) on :
No way. Nintendogs is surprisingly shit. 'Sit. SIT. Sit. Sit? Siiiiiiiiit. St. SIT. WHY WON'T YOU RECOGNISE MY FUCKING VOICE.' *switches off Nintendogs*
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
I didn't get one in the end! I think the desire / obsession may have passed. Hurrah (I think?).
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
I got my wireless DS thing sorted at teh weekend, after muchos hilarity with Zonealarm. If any of you gimps have got Mariokart and a wireless connection, lets sort out a chance for you to spank me at Nintendo from the comfort of your own front room! Also - anybody getting Animal Crossing? Anybody?
h-hello?
[ 23.01.2006, 04:50: Message edited by: Dr. Benway ]
Posted by Fionnula the Cooler (Member # 453) on :
Mario Kart. Yes. Me. My friend code is 021537 253111.
Computer games are taking over my life. In the past month alone, I've somehow managed to spend £400 on games and peripherals. Playing consoles is all I seem to do - that, and play blackjack at online casinos (made almost £1000 profit so far - hooray!). I haven't read a book in weeks. The prospect of reading a book, of the concentration it involves, is not an appealing one. Not when Ouendan's male cheerleading squad has you tapping delightfully hectic patterns of choreography on the screen of your DS. Not when the soundtrack of Castlevania Dawn of Sorrow reminds you of when you were 7 and used to play Teenage Mutant Hero Turtles on the NES. Certainly not when you finally manage to open the temple gates in ICO, and you're hurrying across the bridge with Yorda clinging to your hand, and that happens. Books are worthless then. Still. It doesn't excuse the fact that I have piles of games that I haven't got round to starting yet. What a ret. To compensate, I have decided to write my own RPG. Have I already mentioned this? I don't seem to be capable of keeping track of anything I post any more. It will be set in Iran. It will feature Iranian transsexuals. Adulterous women. Gayboy-martyrs hanged for the crime of loving each other. I will write it, draw it, then send it to Nintendo. It will be like those heady days of early adolescence, writing my own Point Horrors and sending them off to Scholastic Press.
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
Is now a good time to do my tiny bit of showing off? Plllleeeeease? I have been holding in this showing off for a whole week!
I am going to have an essay in an actual book, all about computer games! "Music writer and columnist Miss AMP investigates why certain games, including extreme sports games, appeal mostly to women." Pretty sweet, huh? It's an anthology of New Games Journalism, which explains how I, with my Nintendo-only minimal range of experience, have snuck in under the wire babbling about my enduring love for the SSX series of snowboarding games. As one of only two female writers in the book, I am proud to be some kind of representative of the grrrl gamer massive. So yah boo sucks to whoever said I only wrote about wierd games with snowboarders in and talking animals (even if that is true).
[ 23.01.2006, 06:04: Message edited by: London ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
I think there's been too much academic writing about video games -- almost all of it totally and perversely flatlining any fun out of what is surely the funnest scholarly subject you can imagine. I own about a half dozen and the only really great one is a straight history of how they invented early arcade machines.
However, as this is a collection of journalistic essays I hope it will be very different. I wouldn't say it's a neglected topic -- Trigger Happy and Joystick Nation, both quite good journalistic books on the topic, came out in the late 90s I think -- but well done London and if you can get me a review copy, I will read it.
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
Well done Miss AMP, our in-house games journalist!
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
quote:Originally posted by Fionnula the Cooler: Mario Kart. Yes. Me. My friend code is 021537 253111.
Right, I'll have a crack tonight, say around 7.30? I'll IM you. If you have any other friends, that would be nice too, because I have none.
Posted by Darryn.R (Member # 1) on :
well done amp
Posted by Boy Racer (Member # 498) on :
Nice one London. Could you save us the expense or bother of actually getting a copy by just pasting your article here?
[ 23.01.2006, 07:05: Message edited by: Boy Racer ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
That's true, though the other articles might be good too.
The more I think about it, the more it seems a crime of ideas that I can't remember any writing on video games that really captures the fun of them.
I also think we have a fundamental culture-problem in that arts journalism is usually well-written but lacking rigour and sometimes basic accuracy, whereas cultural studies scholarship is carefully factchecked and theoretically profound but often enbalms the once-exciting stuff it's talking about.
Posted by Boy Racer (Member # 498) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: The more I think about it, the more it seems a crime of ideas that I can't remember any writing on video games that really captures the fun of them.
I don't know about that, I regularly see great articles or reviews that specifically discuss what makes a game or gaming fun in Edge magazine or on the Guardian Guide's Games page.
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: I also think we have a fundamental culture-problem in that arts journalism is usually well-written but lacking rigour and sometimes basic accuracy, whereas cultural studies scholarship is carefully factchecked and theoretically profound but often enbalms the once-exciting stuff it's talking about.
But yes, I do think you have something there.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
quote:Originally posted by Boy Racer: Originally posted by kovacs: The more I think about it, the more it seems a crime of ideas that I can't remember any writing on video games that really captures the fun of them.
I don't know about that, I regularly see great articles or reviews that specifically discuss what makes a game or gaming fun in Edge magazine or on the Guardian Guide's Games page.
Sorry, I meant academic writing really... I don't read much games journalism.
eta: not since Crash: ZX Spectrum in the 1980s. You can't beat that high.
[ 23.01.2006, 07:23: Message edited by: kovacs ]
Posted by Thorn Davis (Member # 65) on :
That's good news London - nice one.
________
I would say PC Zone is the best for invigorating and intelligent writing on games, that manages to combine gurgling enthusiasm with savvy and wit. I love PC Zone. I wish I wrote for them.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
If you go back in time to 1987, I have a forthcoming article in national magazine Crash: ZX Spectrum. You can read it online in nostalgic archive sites now... which is pretty funny as I did it 20 whole years ago. Anyone who wanted a mean laugh could probably quote the worst writing from it on here, and see if it sounds like "me".
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
I find Edge and Guardian to be horse shit. Edge always seems to include things like 'interview with Myamoshi Tankari - designer of Metal Gear Solid 4!", and then the interview is just this staid translated list of statements like 'for this game I wanted to connect with the player experience', or 'we wanted to retain the feel of the the original while giving players a unique experience'. Then it'll be a load of wank from one of the ten games journalists in the country, who'll talk about how gaming died with the dreamcast, followed by a ten page preview or behind the scenes on whatever shit fest is coming our way from Peter Molyneux. (two weeks later: 8/10 - good, but could have been so much better). Then a review of a PC game that needs a graphics card that has only just come out of NASA HQ, and then some 'humourous' parts that aren't funny.
The Guardian games people on the other hand can't really write anything more than an I lIck GameZzz blog, and have a collectively patronising 'aren't computer games brilliant' attitude. All I actually read these days are reviews off of Gamespot. Reading about other people playing games just reminds me that instead of reading this, I could be playing games.
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
but yeah, PC Zone seem alright. Way too little for too much, and I don't play Battlefield or WoW so only read about half of it, but it's the one I've bought most of. I only ever bought it when I was doing my laundry, and since the DS came along, I haven't bought any magazines. I think that Games tm has finished now because their pubisher has evaporated. Who cares? I never bought it.
for a good idea about the world of elder games journalists, read the RAM raider blog, including comments. A load of miserable bitches who spend more time writing about the state of games journalism than they do games.
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
the writing in Edge is too small.
Posted by Boy Racer (Member # 498) on :
[SMALL]
Shrugs.
I don't read much in Edge other than the reviews and the odd article, and I‘ve almost always found them to be of a very high standard.
I disagree with you about the writing in the Guardian only in the case of Nick Gillet who writes the column in The Guide. I think he manages to convey an informed enthusiasm for games, alongside general good taste and good sense in terms of what he rates or slates, and does so entertainingly in a limited space.
I don’t own a PC so I've never read PC Zone.
[/SMALL]
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
Hey, thank you for being nice about my pathetic forays into 'games journalism'! Yeah, I think the idea behind the book came about from the whole New Games Journalism thing which Kieron Gillen kicked off based on the idea that most games journalism was dull-as-shit talk about polygons and cell shading and physics engines, and that the whole gaming mag industry was based around previews of games, with little chance to actually explore what it means to be a participant in the game's world. He thought that maybe if you took some of the verve of New Journalism and added it into games writing, you could maybe capture and convey that experience better.
Of course if I knew more about it, this would be an excellent place to kick off a discussion about new games journalism and whether or not it has a place. Do we want a 'just the facts, ma'am' approach to games journalism - after all, we are going to be spending considerable amounts of our hard-earned cash on hardware and software, and we need to know what we're going to be getting. Or do we want a journalism which attempts to describe the nebulous worlds we inhabit when we play? Is there a point? Gillen describes it as 'travel journalism from imaginary places' - is this valid? Would you want to read travel journalism from imaginary places? Or just go there yourself?
ETC
[ 24.01.2006, 07:10: Message edited by: London ]
Posted by Thorn Davis (Member # 65) on :
I've almost lost the will to even think about games journalism having recently hauled my way through the RAM Raider blog yesterday, which is full of such bitterness and self importance, it completely destroyed my will to read games journalism and almost my will to even play computer games.
Still! Seeing as it's you, London, I will make the effort.
Although 'Travel Journalism from imaginary places' makes for a nice soundbite, it's not really adequate for describing what is essentially a product. It's possible to write a film or book review without wallowing in the Self, and yet still make it interesting. In fact, what you end up with if you try and make it 'new journalism' is stuff like Harry Knowles's awful reviews. Actually - I have to say the vast majority of 'new journalism' does read like that to me - just a torrent of self-promoting wank. Maybe that's just bad New Journalism. After all - that Planetside review is pretty good, and does manage to convey the experience of playing the game. But then! I just don't know! So much of the 'me' journalism, not just in computer games writing is so terrible I think people should be encouraged against it - for the most part it just comes across as ghastly egomaniacs who want to write novels but haven't got the stamina or imagination.
Posted by Louche (Member # 450) on :
On a general games journalism tip, Stuart Campbell's stuff is alright. Certainly not NGJ though, resolutely old school in it's stylings.
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
Yeah, I tend to only read either reviews to make me decide to buy one or not, and then maybe actual facts about the game if I'm interested in it. Also, I like reading reviews and nostalgia for old games that I loved as a kid. Writing about games, not writing from inside games. The virtual worlds of games don't yet seem developed enough to write travel style journalism on, unless you fill it with so much interpretation/imagination/fiction that you may as well make it up from the start. I wouldn't want to read somebody banging on about the amazing role playing AD&D experience they had, you know "I was scared..I gripped my battleaxe and tried to ignore the screams of the marauding orks", when in reality this didn't happen. Let's face it - when you play games, you're actually just a mouth breathing lump, unable to stand to piss, trying to win 'points'. This doesn't make it invalid, but it is a very personal experience that happens in your head.
[ 24.01.2006, 08:15: Message edited by: Dr. Benway ]
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
Although, fast multiplayer combat games probably work. Team mates being cut down beofre your eyes, sniping somebody who didn't see it coming, shooting somebody in the back of the head just as they thought they were about to win. As long as I knew the game, I'd probably enjoy that. I could have written about when Mickey T and I were playing Unreal last in a large scale battle.
But again, I'd rather just play the game that read about it.
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
But then don't you find when you start playing a game (or indulging in any obsession) you want to read stuff around it? History, theory, etc?
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
Sometimes, but usually I'd go to the relevant discussion board for that.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
quote:Originally posted by London: This one's my favourite.
Is this style and approach "new", then? It reads like any number of Sunday supplement columns or articles I've skimmed and screwed up over the last 20 years: wry, conversational, semi-autobiographical... reports from slightly-stylised world where the author is a bit more clever than the reallife them, and always gets the esprit d'escalier comebacks, and comes up with smart replies to other people, and the other people are portrayed as just a tad funnier, quirkier and more caricatured than they really were. Reportage from a neater, smarter, zanier twist on the world we all inhabit. When I was asked to write more journalistic stuff recently, I came out with something almost exactly like this in tone. (And yes, if I read it and it wasn't by me, I'd be slagging it). I didn't know I was doing anything "New" but maybe I'd internalised all that crap I picked up from smug newspapers and mags, and was able to reproduce it.
Anyway, that writing didn't seem novel or (in a good way) clever to me -- that is, it was clever but not insightful or intelligent. And surely we don't really need articles now that treat circa 1995 innovations like avatars, online chat, cybersex and people saying LOL as something worthy of eyebrow-raised investigation.
As for that maxim about travel literature from imaginary places. I would like to read something like this, and haven't, as far as I know. Benway's idea seemed valid, though I don't know why you think only networked multiplayer games would be interesting. If someone wrote vividly and with talent about their experiences as CJ within GTA's Los Santos, I think that could be really fascinating. As I noted on Urban Dead thread, I was even finding that report from within an incredibly boring zombie game pretty compelling at times -- the tone people were using to communicate, and the military abbreviations and slang that seemed to be evolving.
Posted by Louche (Member # 450) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: Is this style and approach "new", then?
Surely the idea is that it's new to games journalism specifically, hence it's full title of "New Games Journalism" rather than just "New Journalism"? Reviewing a game has traditionally been a drier affair, taking the game apart and discussing it in terms of the quality of graphics, sounds, etc, while this NGJ comes at things from a slightly different angle. And with that I'm neither defending or attacking it, or even saying whether I think it holds up as a concept under scrutiny, I'm just saying what it's supposed to mean as I understand it.
[ 24.01.2006, 12:09: Message edited by: Louche ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
OK, I have cleared up a slight confusion in my own head: I was going to say in the last post that I thought "New Journalism" was Tom Wolfe in the 1970s, and a quick flick to Wikipedia confirms this.
On "new" and "old" games journalism:
quote:Neither term refers to writing from a specific time period, and both have existed for years. Rather, the word 'New' is used in reference to New Journalism.
So the idea is that "New Journalism", despite being over 30 years old and perhaps becoming the dominant journalistic style except in actual news reportage, hadn't yet reached games journalism until some spark thought of applying this "New" (old) approach to the form? Despite the fact that it's common in music journalism, film journalism, TV journalism, lifestyle journalism and so on. It seems a surprising idea, and I'm sure I read personal-experience, anecdotal articles about computer gaming way, way back in the 1980s when New Journalism really was only ten years old. One of the regular columnists called himself Hunter S. Minson as an homage to Hunter S Thompson. L@@K you can even read this new oldskool stuff online.
However, maybe games journalism (old) has just been slow to catch up with the dominant form of journalism?
"Bow, Nigger" was good. I enjoyed it even though it was self-aggrandising and suspiciously like reportage from that stylised, tweaked, marginally better-than-real version of the real world. Yes, I know it's by the same person as the "LOL Barbie" article I just dismissed.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
quote:Originally posted by Louche: Surely the idea is that it's new to games journalism specifically, hence it's full title of "New Games Journalism" rather than just "New Journalism"? Reviewing a game has traditionally been a drier affair, taking the game apart and discussing it in terms of the quality of graphics, sounds, etc, while this NGJ comes at things from a slightly different angle.
Yes, this was the conclusion I just reached... that games journalism has been weirdly slow in catching up with the conventions of almost all other journalism.
However, I really don't think it deserves all the trumpet of an acronym, and this bollox as if it were some sort of cult with a list of the cool crusading names, and recommended reading. It's just the usual type of journalism, finally reaching the traditionally geeky, unimaginative sphere of computer games reviews, as far as I can make out. It's not the fucking Futurist Manifesto!
Posted by Louche (Member # 450) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: However, I really don't think it deserves all the trumpet of an acronym, and this bollox as if it were some sort of cult with a list of the cool crusading names, and recommended reading. It's just the usual type of journalism, finally reaching the traditionally geeky, unimaginative sphere of computer games reviews, as far as I can make out.
I think I more or less agree with this which is why I was at pains in my last post to say I wasn't really supporting the idea, just explaining it. From what I've read a lot of people in the industry, and the general public, completely reject the concept of NGJ. Believing instead that the whole thing's an invention of the first person to coin the phrase (who's name currently escapes me) just to get his self an instant reputation. Sort of like your Gillian McKeith's of the world spouting a whole load of nonsense but doing it convincingly enough to earn a higher public profile. That's just an impression I've formed from reading various game-related sites and blogs though to be honest.
I'm not so sure about your accusation of gaming 'eventually catching up' with other forms of journalism. The reason computer game reviews have traditionally been dryer than perhaps music reviews is simply because they can be. Music has no such defining factors as 'quality of sound and graphics', nothing that can be directly, and pretty much objectively, compared to other bands in the same genre. Music is so much more a matter of opinion that can't be backed up with any technical meaurement like, I dunno, polygon counts and the like. Music is also a helluva lot more diverse so you can't as easily compare one band to it's predecessors to give people a good idea of how good it is (although that doesn't stop a lot of music journalists from going right ahead and doing this of course). Granted, how good as an overall package a game is will always be subjective but people want to know whether the sound is as good as other current FPS', or if the graphics on an MMORPG game stack up against WoW's, whether the controls are as responsive and intuitive as whatever the classic RTS is. All things that I'd argue not only can you simply state as almost-facts but the audience also benefits from your doing so. I mean that's one of the major criticisms of NGJ, a game review in that style doesn't tell you if the thing's actually any good or not and at the end of the day that's assumedly why you're reading a review of something, if it's also an entertaining piece of writing then that's just a bonus.
ETA: Although everything I've just said is only applicable to actual game reviews of course, any more general writing about games isn't constrained by the factors I've mentioned which sort of undermines my entire post. Oh well.
[ 24.01.2006, 13:13: Message edited by: Louche ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
quote:Originally posted by Louche: I'm not so sure about your accusation of gaming 'eventually catching up' with other forms of journalism. The reason computer game reviews have traditionally been dryer than perhaps music reviews is simply because they can be. Music has no such defining factors as 'quality of sound and graphics', nothing that can be directly, and pretty much objectively, compared to other bands in the same genre. Music is so much more a matter of opinion that can't be backed up with any technical meaurement like, I dunno, polygon counts and the like.
I'm not sure if this is true. I wonder if you ("we") just think it's true because that's the way it's been, and because music, film, television reviews have been different. To return to my favourite oldskool example, Crash and its sister magazines of the 1980s categorised games in brutally quantitative terms, following subjective reviews with "Getting Started: 87%". "Use of Graphics: 63%". "Hookability: 97% A CRASH SMASH!" As someone in education, I don't know how the fuck they decided between a 62% and a 63%. We have exam boards about that sort of thing, and sit around double-marking and discussing, and use faculty-agreed guidelines for what a 62 is as opposed to a 63, and it still seems arbitrary.
However, as someone in film, I think you could quite easily have a tradition of film journalism much like old gaming journalism. "Cinematography: 45%". "Music: 82%." "Title sequence: 54%". Yes, it's an inexact science. So is judging whether a game has "good graphics". It's no more sensible to review music in a game in terms of "is it any good" than it is to talk about Ennio Morricone, James Horner and Michael Nyman film soundtracks in that way. I think that may be just the way the different traditions evolved.
quote: Music is also a helluva lot more diverse so you can't as easily compare one band to it's predecessors to give people a good idea of how good it is (although that doesn't stop a lot of music journalists from going right ahead and doing this of course).
Well... I think you can. You can certainly do it in cinema -- it's evidently possible to review a film in terms of previous examples of its genre, or by its director, or starring its actor.
quote:Granted, how good as an overall package a game is will always be subjective but people want to know whether the sound is as good as other current FPS', or if the graphics on an MMORPG game stack up against WoW's, whether the controls are as responsive and intuitive as whatever the classic RTS is. All things that I'd argue not only can you simply state as almost-facts but the audience also benefits from your doing so.
Again, I don't see a major difference. People want to know if the end of the latest romcom is as weepy as My Best Friend's Wedding, if a horror is more or less frightening than Ring 2. In fact, the last I saw (at my barber's... the place Roland Barthes lowered himself to reading popular mags) Empire was reducing film reviews to categories much like this: "WHAT'S GOOD ABOUT IT?" "WHAT'S BAD?" "SEE IT IF YOU LIKE...[list of similar films]"
To be honest... I think the big distinction is between reviews, and articles. The "new" games journalism isn't appropriate as a straight review. That kind of journalism, based around personal anecdote and stylistic showboating, wouldn't be much help in a straight film review either.
ETA think you came to this conclusion yourself, at the end of your last post.
[ 24.01.2006, 13:49: Message edited by: kovacs ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
I'm going to "play" that simulated-world thing There that the NGJ archly puzzles over in his article about Performing Barbie.
I expect it's rubbish like every avatar-based chat I've ever seen.
Who was it that described cyberspace as "there's no there, there." Perhaps Gibson quoting someone else within a novel? I could find out within 2 sex online of course, but ho hum, better to ask human beings for answers.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Who remembers years ago (01) my hilarious regular TMO (/Seethru?) column updating readers about progress with my "internet girlfriend", a piece of software my then-girlfriend bought me. That was proper.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
So far There is blank, honestly I could see this sort of thing by sticking a bit of A4 paper on my scr
Posted by Jack Vincennes (Member # 814) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: Who was it that described cyberspace as "there's no there, there." Perhaps Gibson quoting someone else within a novel?
Quoting Gertrude Stein apparently, but since I found that out through google it doesn't count as a human being telling you.
[ 24.01.2006, 17:13: Message edited by: Jack Vincennes ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
OK I think I've been on There for a pretty long time! it is the best new thing I've seen online in probably months.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
I'd like you all to meet my new online girlfriend Tess_7.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
and I'm still there, there.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
I should really go to bed.
[ 24.01.2006, 21:05: Message edited by: kovacs ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Yeah as I predicted... time-wasting rubbish. Graphics 68% Hookability 91% A CRASH SMASH!
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Jesus wept was I on it for 5-6 hours? Posted by Modge (Member # 64) on :
you're creepy.
Posted by MiscellaneousFiles (Member # 60) on :
quote:Originally posted by Modge: you're creepy.
Alright, Tess?
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Shit... just got out of bed and fucking There is down for maintenance! My home has gone.
Posted by ben (Member # 13) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: When I was asked to write more journalistic stuff recently, I came out with something almost exactly like this in tone. (And yes, if I read it and it wasn't by me, I'd be slagging it). I didn't know I was doing anything "New" but maybe I'd internalised all that crap I picked up from smug newspapers and mags, and was able to reproduce it.
Probably the only really enjoyable feature I've read in The Guardian in the past six months was the "Guardian readers' Books of the Year" roundup that appeared sometime over Christmas.
It was great, all the people contributing wrote in this appalling Guardian 'cultural house style' that they'd absorbed - osmosiswise - after reading acres upon acres of this type of rotten feature (you know, the ones where they always include lists from JG Ballard, Max Hastings and some twat columnist like Rowan Pelling or AA Gill). Net result was a succession of potted summary judgements primed for inclusion on the paperback blurb of the the 'underrated gem' or 'magisterial history' under discussion.
The joke being, of course, that these little triumphs of slaved-over breathlessness have about as much chance of gracing the back cover or 'praise for' pages of Short History of Ukrainian Tractors as do my words of acclaim* for The Da Vinci Code.
*"A puddle of pig-wank, wanked from a pig by rough, inexpert hands."
[ 25.01.2006, 09:46: Message edited by: ben ]
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
quote:Originally posted by ben: AA Gill
I like AA Gill! I think he's great! His travel writings especially. Read AA Gill is Away. Yeah, he tries too be hard to be funny and a bit curmudgeon, but his observations make me laugh and beneath that facade of smug twatness, he writes with a genuine love of humanity, surprising cultural sensitivity and healthy disdain of Eurocentric mores. Really, that book is quite beautiful.
Also: when I see his pitcher I get this funny feeling.
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
should be ashamed?
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
always.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
I will read it once I've finished soaring my hoverboard around "Zephyr"
are u jealous much of my imaginary life. losers! i send you a postcard from virtual space
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
all the chicks in your imaginary life look at least eighteen, kovacs. are you feeling alright?
Posted by Thorn Davis (Member # 65) on :
quote:Originally posted by vikram: all the chicks in your imaginary life look at least eighteen, kovacs. are you feeling alright?
Samuel Norton keeps making jokes along these lines. Samuel Norton.
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
now i do feel ashamed. sorry kovacs! sorry tmo! sorry world Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
it's a virtual world not a perfect world, Vikram
this "game" is so good I've wanted a piss for an hour and not got out of my chair -- you can quote me on that
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
my god, maybe i should make joikes abour how ariel sharon is named after laundry powder.
mon ami natch ****
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
There are no kids in the world, but there are dogs, I'll show you
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: it's a virtual world not a perfect world, Vikram
aha, vindicated! note to self: thorn is teh devil.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
no cats apparently, so obviously a flawed world.
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
are there zombies?
Posted by Roy (Member # 705) on :
Kovacs' character looks a bit too camp.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
quote:Louise J Bird Altrincham, Cheshire Sybille Bedford's Quicksands (Hamish Hamilton), is a wonderful memoir, which should be enjoyed like a wine of superior quality.
Couldn't make it up.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
quote:This year's A Reading Diary: A Passionate Reader's Reflection on a Year of Books (Canongate) was a timely reminder of how and why one reads.
pmsl get a life
Posted by ben (Member # 13) on :
quote:
I'm sorry, but is this a joke? It looks to me like the gayest thing of all time - gayer than Edward II sorting through his Judy Garland records wearing a Queen Mother apron in Barrymore's pool.
I know it's totally reactionary and old hat of me, but whenever I hear people going on about games I just feel tremendously drained - as though they were talking about this really great round of golf they played with Mr Udigawa, JD and Fat Mal from Accounts Payable. Come on, people - you could be doing something good! Posted by ralph (Member # 773) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: pmsl get a life
Says the man who couldn't step away from the computer to pee. Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
returning to that Possessing Barbie article -- you all saw the nature and size of those speech bubbles.
it seems even less likely now that he typed anything like
quote:“See that's a perfectly good way of dealing with the issue. In fact, I think it's pretty fantastic that you're a savvy enough mother to play with her sons no matter how old they are.”
and that she replied
quote:“Kids can’t do that. They have fewer warning systems, because they have been hurt less and they are more open. But they want to explore and there are people who will take advantage of that innocence and curiosity.”
Posted by LowLevel (Member # 30) on :
BEN = No good at games
QED
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Ben, it's called "imagination", use it Posted by ben (Member # 13) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: There are no kids in the world, but there are dogs, I'll show you
I mean, how lame. Surely the challenge of raising a virtual child is going to be a much more multi-dimensional experience than looking after a virtual frigging dog. Looking after real dogs is dull and wearing enough - why bother to replicate this in a world where you can supposedly "do anything"??
O yeah - I taught him to beg today.
I mean Christ. How about teaching a child to beg? That at least would raise a few stimulating - if troubling - ethical issues.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
although talking of "imagination"... this little lady isn't leaving much to... it. the imagination, that is.
who said games were for "geeks" who never got to look at a woman? Posted by Roy (Member # 705) on :
What is the purpose of this game, then?
Posted by ben (Member # 13) on :
To become the best loved character in Summer Bay. Currently Kovacs hovers at a liked/respected level roughly equivalent to veteran cornershop curmudgeon Alf Stewart.
Posted by jonesy999 (Member # 5) on :
This 'game' looks like it could be a good replacement for Urban Dead.
Posted by Roy (Member # 705) on :
Posted by jonesy999 (Member # 5) on :
Poor Mart.
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
the winner gets:
good luck, kovacs!
haven't watched home & away for years. is she still going out with her sister danni's rapist? that was a screwed up plot line. last i saw, danni was on trial for attempted murder.
i guess now the stories are about white vs lebanese riots at alf's bait shop.
[ 25.01.2006, 12:15: Message edited by: vikram ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
London must be thrilled how her thread developed. Not only did I follow up the links to "NGJ", I actually started writing a travelogue myself, but pushed the "envelope" by including pictures from a virtual land, as well.
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
yes, i think she is so very happy she doesn't know how to express her joy and all her winter blues have gone and she may even have joined this virtual world herself
[ 25.01.2006, 11:39: Message edited by: vikram ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
I don't really do anything in this game except chat up girls. I'm sure if everyone else joined, they'd soon be owning islands, setting up shops, building spaceships.
:shrug:
:meh:
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
was in Home & Away!!!
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
"I always look back on Home & Away with fondness, especially when I'm in the UK. But I had no idea what I was doing back then. I just fell into acting. It was only later that I became passionate about it."
Why don't I remember him?
He was married to Danni Mingue too!
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
Thank you all for talking about New Games Journalism on this thread, and for playing a game and doing pictures. Me and Benway had a conversation about how NGJ is crap when you're writing from 'within the game', but if you're analysing gaming as a lifestyle thing - how Singstar can impact on your social life, how The Sims can ruin or reflect or salvage your relationship - this has more value, is more interesting. But it was a real life conversation with our actual mouths and is not written down. I wish we could press our minds to the screen and make the words come out of our memories.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Just printing this out at the moment so I thought I'd paste it in as demonstration of the phenomenon I observed above -- that when required to write "journalism", I automatically turn out exactly the smug, lying, self-serving semi-fiction I deride.
quote:Jedi Nights: Star Wars fans in Tunisia
Will Brooker
SAMPLE CHAPTER
Darth Konikus wants to talk to me.
Ten minutes beforehand, I’d posted a message on TheForce.Net, an amateur-run but professionally-designed Star Wars website that attracts 1.4 million hits a week. My message stated that I was planning a book about a fan pilgrimage to the locations in Tunisia where George Lucas had filmed the desert planet Tatooine, home of Luke Skywalker. I gave my email address for anyone interested.
Now Darth Konikus wants to talk to me. I click his name on my MSN Messenger list, and type a tentative hello. His reply rattles up.
Saw your message… me and the wife are proud geeks.
I ask him what it means to him, being a geek.
Well we got Darth Vader stood in the front room
Taken aback, I lift my fingers from the keyboard: the textual version of a gaping mouth, stunned silence. Darth Konikus helps out.
You can click on here to see him
He pastes in a web address. I type OK and follow the link as he keeps talking. A window opens showing the Dark Lord of the Sith, towering in black armour next to a threadbare pale blue sofa. Vader is staring out of the suburban living-room window, a security guard.
That’s my costume. We both have quite high quality costumes.
Most impressive, I reply. My email chimes. Another request has popped up: JediJimbo wants to talk to me. I tell Darth Konikus I’ll have to get back to him later.
No prob, any way if you fancy a chat wether or not you want us in your book get back to me! MTFBWY
And with you, I type without thinking, giving away my own geekiness. Any normal person would assume Konikus had let his cat walk over the keyboard: I recognised it as the Star Wars sign-off, May The Force Be With You. I click back on the picture of Darth Vader in the sitting-room, to make myself feel better. At least I’d never go that far.
Posted by MiscellaneousFiles (Member # 60) on :
More! More!
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
OK... did you like it, then. There is some better stuff later about talking to a 14 year-old online, though in the original doc the MSN conversations are in a different font, and so it's more readable and easily distinguishable.
Posted by squeegy (Member # 136) on :
I'm quite keen for a bit more too.
Posted by squeegy (Member # 136) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: There is some better stuff later about talking to a 14 year-old online
Cue Mr S. Norton
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Here you go thanks for being so positive. Remember that anyone apart from "me", "talking", is usually in a different font to indicate that they're illiterate geeks for me to laugh at and sympathise with... LOL.
quote:And with you, I type without thinking, giving away my own geekiness. Any normal person would assume Konikus had let his cat walk over the keyboard: I recognised it as the Star Wars sign-off, May The Force Be With You. I click back on the picture of Darth Vader in the sitting-room, to make myself feel better. At least I’d never go that far.
Fan cultures are hierarchical: there’s always someone geekier than you. However extreme your involvement, someone’s gone further, sunk lower. You spend your weekend writing stories about Han Solo and Leia Organa? Someone else is writing homoerotica about Han and Luke. You watch Empire Strikes Back on DVD every night? Someone else is sitting on their sofa in a home-made stormtrooper outfit. There’s always one guy taking it down to the next level.
What may seem to an outsider like a happy, harmless collection of nerds is in fact a large community structured and subdivided into multiple smaller categories, gangs and groups; and they often hate each other’s guts. TPM bashers, who were disillusioned by the first prequel movie, The Phantom Menace, hold TPM gushers in contempt for their uncritical worship of George Lucas. The two sides form, only half-jokingly, into attack and defence squadrons, awarding themselves military rankings and organising raids on each other’s internet boards.
Genfic writers, whose amateur stories are tame, heterosexual romances, look down on slash writers, who focus on gay pairings forbidden by Lucasfilm. Slash writers, in turn, distance themselves from hurt-comfort authors, whose stories are an excuse for sado-masochistic play and rape fantasies: one Jedi is captured by a Sith, and the other rescues him too late. However deviant those fantasies become, though, they still seem innocent compared to one ghastly smear of a story I discovered on an obscure website: the young boy Anakin Skywalker in sexual congress with the giant slug of an alien gangster, Jabba the Hutt.
Unlike Darth Konikus, I am not a proud geek. I try to excuse my enthusiasm for Star Wars on the grounds of academic research – a conference paper on fandom, an article about digital cinema or slash. I reassure myself that I don’t dress up in costume, I just write about people who do it. I don’t spend my weekends dreaming up stories about Star Wars characters in sex romps… well, just that one time, but it was an experiment. I had to try it, just to see how the conventions work. All my mini-action figures and toy spaceships are stored in my parents’ loft; I’ve barely seen them since the early 80s. That Clone Trooper figure next to my computer? Well, my wife bought me it. As a kind of joke. I only own that light-up, glow in the dark Sith spoon, shaped like a lightsaber, because a student gave me it. No, don’t pick it up, don’t mess with it.
Maybe I’m a worse kind of geek; a geek who won’t admit it. But JediJimbo still wants to talk to me. Bored of waiting for me to add him on MSN Messenger, he sent an email instead. His typing isn’t great. I have been into SW ever since I fist saw it when aged around 3 or 4.
Around 13 I lost my interest.
My girlfriend found 3 star wars books in a chairty shop she ran and bought them home for me, my brother bought one on a school trip for me. But I had no interest in reading them. At the age of 23 my father passed away and I had to quit work to raise my 13 year old brother. While tidying a room I found the 4 star wars books and thought 'What the hell. I'll read one.'
Since that day Star Wars has been in my life every day.
I buy any magazine that has the star wars logo, I search ebay and the internet for star wars related items I may enjoy. My girlfriend calls me obsessed, but I know there are worse out there. I would just say it was my hobby.
I am looking at having a star wars related tattoo, which she thinks is obsessed! I look forward to many conventions and am even trying to start work on a costume. At the end of the day it is what I love and it makes me happy.
So if it makes you happy, it can't be that bad!
I save the mail for future reference. I’m wondering whether I’ll come to regret the plan to spend a week with ten guys like this, in the middle of the desert. Jim is clearly one of the more harmless varieties, a hobbyist rather than hardcore, but even he thinks getting inked with a Star Wars logo and spending evenings dressing like one of the characters is reasonable behaviour. It’s a relief when my email chimes again and two female names appear in my inbox. Women might make the trip saner, diluting the male fan-madness.
I open the mail from Leslie. I am female, slightly the wrong side of 50, and have been a Star Wars fan since the first film in 1977. I am an American citizen but I have lived in the UK since 1989. I am currently living out near Heathrow Airport in Staines
Staines is beyond the boundaries of London, a 90-minute journey into the petit-bourgeois Tudor housing and teenage chav culture of Surrey. I don’t want to travel out to Staines to interview anyone. I click on Clara’s name. She’s waiting to chat on MSN; her opening line gushes across my screen. I would love to be part of this project because I love Star Wars. You have probably herd this before but it really is my life.
I ask her where she lives. London, Darwin Street don’t know if you have heard of it.
She sounds promising. I start working out the best route to her address. Then it gets weird. How old are u again … Forgot
I never told you, I type. I didn’t think it mattered. My mum keeps asking
Alarm sirens wail. Primly, I tell her I’m 35. I’m 13 …14 tomorrow
Visions of tabloid headlines swim up on my screen. Professor Porn Lured Me With His Lightsabre.
Happy birthday, I type. I’ll be back soon. Where u going
I’m going to Staines.
***
Staines is forty minutes West of Waterloo on a fast train; the woman selling me my ticket looks it up and tells me with surprise that it’s “out of zone”, off the London map. This is Ali G country: outside the grotty cottage of a train station, the newsagent has a sign prohibiting hoods and hats. A white wannabe gangster with a cap perched back on his head is boasting about how many men he squared up to last night. A teenage mum carries a toddler twelve years younger than herself. I tell the cab driver I want the Wheatsheaf and Pigeon. “Going for a drink?” he slyly observes.
Leslie is sitting on a bench outside the pub, with a glass of Coke which she sips throughout our hour-long interview. It’s chilly and we’re near traffic and roadworks, but she’d rather stay outside. Her hands shake. I don’t know whether it’s nerves or cold.
Leslie looks like she gave up on glamour some time ago. Everything about her, from her monkish haircut to her sensible fawn-coloured jacket and navy-blue sweater, says function; except for her jewellery, which screams geek. She wears a huge Boba Fett helmet, fashioned in silver, on one finger, and a matching Bantha Skull – Fett’s insignia – around her neck.
She saw Star Wars on its first release in 1977, when she lived in Connecticut, New England, but her interest was really sparked by 1980’s Empire Strikes Back, which introduced the bounty hunter characters. As an icebreaker, to warm her up and stop her shaking, I start trying to name them, deliberately forgetting. She reels them off: Bossk, IG-88, Dengar, 4-Lom, Zuckuss and Fett. The list is like a mantra, bringing back my own memories of 1980 – lining up the action figures and posing them with their pistols.
She didn’t like The Phantom Menace, but not for the reasons most bashers give – too much CGI and slapstick, not enough characterisation. “The only bounty hunter in it was Aurra Sing,” she says with contempt, “and if you blinked, you missed her.”
So, you’re just a fan of bounty hunters in general.
“And the clones,” she shrugs.
Well, the clone troopers are genetically created from Jango Fett, Boba’s father, I muse. So, you like them because they’re based on Fett?
Another casual shrug. “And the armour.”
How about stormtroopers, I ask, pursuing this line of logic.
“I haven’t gotten into collecting the Stormies as much. I like the character of Fett, although I do have the other hunters in my collection.”
Already a subtle distinction is emerging between my fandom and Leslie’s. It’s not that I don’t like bounty hunters, but I’d never call Imperial Stormtroopers “Stormies”; that’s just coy, twee. She’s in a different camp to me, and when she blunders that Empire Strikes Back was released in “82… 83,” I place myself a few rungs above her on the hierarchy.
I follow up about Fett, asking her why she’s so fascinated with a character who only has a few lines of dialogue.
“It’s the mystery of the character, and to kids, the armour looks cool,” she dissembles, then becomes more animated, sounding like a kid herself. “And he’s got the jetpack, and the flamethrower. He’ll work for whoever pays. Jabba pays him to be a bodyguard as well as hunt bounty. His origin story’s interesting… Jango was rescued by Jaster Mereel, if you read Boba Fett: Open Season… that’s when Jango is about 7, 8… his family gets killed by renegade Mandalorians.”
I don’t read the Star Wars Expanded Universe paperbacks, which stand in an uncertain relationship to the official canon and continuity of the films – these are semi-authorised tales of the Star Wars universe, liable to be made redundant when one of the films contradicts them. Leslie can cite them chapter and verse. Secretly I think she’s wasting her time. Now she’s telling me how Boba Fett escaped his apparent death in Return of the Jedi.
“He’s got a helmet cam so he can see what happened to him afterwards, and he knows that Han Solo put him in there… that’s in Dark Empire, either part 1 or 2, I can’t recall. In the Boba Fett story in Tales of the Bounty Hunters, he and Han face off on Jubilar…”
So, you don’t think that finding out more about Boba Fett spoils the mystery? I interrupt.
“No… I don’t think so. Hm. It doesn’t lessen the appeal of the character.”
This seems a dead end. I start testing the depths of her Boba Fett trivia, asking if she knows the designation of his ship.
“Slave One, it’s a Firespray,” she says immediately, with a mixture of pride and apology. “Quatt Driveyards Firespray. It was actually a prototype. If you play the Bounty Hunter game there’s a level where he steals Slave One.”
Is obsession a fair word for your feelings towards Boba Fett?
“I’d say so.” She plays with her bounty hunter bling. “I’ve got my ring… and the Bantha skull, well it’s been explained by Abel Pena in Insider about Mandalorians, that it wasn’t a bantha but something similar. I’d have to dig the issue out. It’s the insignia of Jaster’s regiment of Mandalorians…”
I steer her away from the Expanded Universe, asking what else she’s bought.
“A whole flat full of collectibles.” Again the pride mixed with self-consciousness. “Jango and Boba… the occasional Slave 1… the odd Jedi… I’ve got some expensive stuff, the Code 3 Slave 1 signature edition, expensive and highly detailed, with a big plexiglass display case. It was a gift. It’s expensive though. I’ve also got two Attakus Fett figures… Jango I got from Artoo-Deetoys, Boba was bought by my partner, and he was rather expensive. He got it for my birthday.”
Collectors clearly have their own jargon, and even to me it seems like Leslie’s slipping into a foreign language. I’m finding it hard to keep track of whether she’s talking about her romantic partner, or Boba Fett.
“It’s very detailed. Very. He paid around 11 hundred US dollars for it. And I’ve got a Boba standee, life-sized but cardboard.”
Do you know how much you’ve spent?
“I don’t even wanna go there.”
Would you wear a costume? I ask, imagining how a solid, 5’5 woman in her early 50s would look in battle armour and bandoliers.
“I don’t know, if someone gave me a Fett costume I’d probably try it on… but I’m not really into sewing and things like that. Actually, there was an Infinities story about how Boba was very young, the Jaster Mereel days… a female bounty hunter called Sintas was married to Fett, and had a baby, which was mentioned in Gamer, and when Abel did his Mandalorian article, he brought up the concept of the baby growing up to be female…and taking on the persona of Fett, using the same armour…”
My murmurs of assent start sounding like not this again. Yes, I tell her: I see the concept. I change the subject. Do any fans take it too far?
“Some people might consider someone with an apartment of Fett figures too far,” she chuckles. “I don’t think that’s too far. I think sitting outside of Skywalker Ranch and stalking George Lucas might be too far. If it causes disturbance to one of the people who appeared in it, stalking Natalie Portman or something, I think that’d be too far. And slash fiction is going too far. On my Force.Net forum, we don’t allow slash, period. I personally haven’t read any.”
So, Leslie would look down on my own secret experiments in fan-fiction. The ranking of acceptable and unacceptable geekdom is clearly a flexible, subjective scale.
What if their religion is the Force? I ask abruptly.
“That’s not taking it too far.”
What if they were basing it on the Dark Side?
“Well, if they were walking around doing Force lightning on everyone, like Palpatine, then that would be too far.”
Are your friends equally… obsessed?
“Nah. I’ve met a couple of people through the Force.Net forum, and we went to Collectormania in Milton Keynes. But that’s it.”
If people come round your house, do they comment? Are they surprised?
“Well, there isn’t one room that doesn’t have some kind of figure in it.”
If someone wasn’t a fan, would you have them round your house? Because they might think it was unusual.
“Ah, they probably would. But I’d still have ’em over. People have their interests. Other people might have china cats on the desk, and I’m not gonna look down on them! They have stuffed animals… some people collect frogs.”
Live frogs?
“No, china frogs, stuffed frogs.”
Would you want to visit the locations where Star Wars was shot?
“Ehh… I’d go,” she offers off-handedly. “It would probably interest me.”
You don’t sound too keen.
“The locations that mainly interest me, where the Fetts were, are mostly CGI. You can’t really go to visit them.”
***
Back at home, Clara pops up on my screen. I figure there’s no harm in talking to a thirteen year-old online, as long as I take it cautiously. I tell her if I was to interview her, I’d have to talk to her mother on the phone first. k i'll e-mail you the number
Do you think she’d be happy with the idea of me coming to your house, to interview you? I don’t think you’d be able to travel to Tunisia. you would have to talk to her but I’m pretty sure she'll be fine by it if you are polite. LOL!
I don’t expect Clara’s really Laughing Out Loud; some people just type LOL at the end of every sentence, like a nervous tic.
Are you sure? I ask her. Your mum would let you go with a bunch of strangers to Tunisia? What time is it
The Tunisia trip? It’s… probably going to be June 2006. No, what time is it now
Oh, sorry… half past ten. PM?
Yes, I type. I’m getting a little sharp and snippy with this kid. It’s not morning, I point out. Look out of the window and you can see. k well i have school from (in london time)8:00AM-3:10PM
I squint at the screen, wondering whether she thinks I live in the US; then decide to move the interview on, and ask her if she has friends who are equally into Star Wars. Her answer pours out. i have a freind who liked it not as much as me but still liked it but now he has left it for doctor who.It upset me when he said he didn't like it annymore cause now i have nobody to talk about it to.(in school when it gets boring)
That’s a shame, I type, and mean it. You can like Star Wars and Doctor Who at the time time, though, I remind her. I used to like the new doctor who but ever since it took over my friend I don't like it anymore
I change the subject for her own benefit: or try to. Do you think any fans are too geeky, going too far? YES my friend was,i'm not saying that i don't believe him cause i kinda do but he said that there was such thing as the force.
So he believed he had Jedi powers? he kept on calling me his padawan
Despite myself, I find this pretty funny; the idea of a thirteen year-old boy trying to fool his schoolgirl crush he holds the power of the Force, and telling her she’s his padawan, or apprentice.
So, he thought he could train you? yeah LOL, I’m on the floor laughing
I type a LOL too. It’s funny how Star Wars can bond you with the unlikeliest of people, uniting you through a shared code and understanding.
Linking back to Leslie’s interview, I ask Clara if she’s ever worn a Star Wars costume. i am too big to fit into any costumes and i am way too young to make my own.(which makes me so jealous of the ''dress up people'') costumes in shops are for kids and I don’t know how to make them
Couldn’t your mum help you? My mum hasn’t got the time to make costumes.
Her reply is firm, stubborn defensiveness coming across even through the text. What does she do for work? I ask.
A pause. She works in Tescos
And Clara adds the MSN “blush” smiley, a yellow face with hot cheeks. It’s a sad sentence; she’s proud of her mum, but feels the need to apologise for her to other people.
I quickly type: She probably works really hard. The answer flashes up fiercely. She does she works really hard.
Do you have any brothers or sisters? No I don’t have a dad or any brothers or sisters
So, do you think that’s one of the reasons Star Wars is really important to you? Yes it is I think but also because it’s the best film ever.
OK, I wind up. In theory, would you want to travel to see the locations where they filmed Tatooine, in Tunisia? I don’t really mind… I’d like to see where they’re made but I don’t know Tunisia
Neither do I. Snap
I stare at the screen, bemused. Maybe this is how thirteen year-olds talk, and type; almost on another wavelength, though our shared fandom joined us for a moment. I say a quick goodbye to her.
It’s past 11pm. I check my email and find three new chat requests. Raj Vader wants to talk to me. Darth Thundercat wants to talk to me. Junior Vader wants to talk to me. You get the feeling some of these guys live Star Wars 24/7, midnight to midnight. There’s always someone who takes it further, who makes you feel less of a geek yourself. On TF.N there’s 1.4 million of them every week.
Right now I don’t want to talk to any of them. I turn my Clone Trooper figure to the wall, turn off the computer, turn off my fandom for the night.
[ 27.01.2006, 14:32: Message edited by: kovacs ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
quote:Originally posted by vikram: the winner gets:
good luck, kovacs!
Oh, do I win this? Is she legal? She looks super.
Posted by ralph (Member # 773) on :
More Star Wars talk, please! It's making me feel better about myself. Posted by MiscellaneousFiles (Member # 60) on :
An interesting read. When's it due in Waterstones?
I want to go to Tatooine. Posted by rooster (Member # 738) on :
heehee, I'd go
Thanks for the amusing read.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
You can come with me, if you pretend you never knew me beforehand, and (unless I get some whacking advance) pay your way.
Posted by not... (Member # 25) on :
MTFBWY excellent! and the MSN chat with the 13 year old still manages to come across as slightly creepy even with your clear attempts to be objective.
ETA: spelt manages wrong
[ 27.01.2006, 11:12: Message edited by: not... ]
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Actually... siriusly... though they are still pitching this (they tell me) to publishers, I assume it is going ahead, so if you know anyone who would be a good bet for this project -- interesting enough to be entertaining, but sane enough not to punish me -- it is still entirely open.
When the time comes I'm going to put up a notice on TheForce.Net and hope I get hundreds of replies that I can weed decent people from, but just now I have nobody on board yet.
Posted by MiscellaneousFiles (Member # 60) on :
quote:Originally posted by kovacs: You can come with me...
Really? Excellent!
quote:...if you pretend you never knew me beforehand...
No problem there.
quote:...and (unless I get some whacking advance) pay your way.
Damn. I knew there'd be a catch.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Also, I'd be obliged to make fun of you in the book, because that's what people want to read.
Posted by jonesy999 (Member # 5) on :
It's a cruel world.
Also, I like your sample chapter Kovacs.
Posted by kovacs (Member # 28) on :
Thanks, I wasn't expecting any kind words at all! I might go through it now putting in some italics to make it easier to read.
eta: that conversation with the 13 year old girl was transcribed faithfully, without any lies, ie. it was just as weird, unnerving and faintly saddening as it comes across there.
I don't mean to be tasteless, but think it suggests, contrary to my enemies' beliefs, that I'd be a rubbish paedophile.* I have no easy rapport with anyone under the age of 18.
* tag!
[ 27.01.2006, 14:36: Message edited by: kovacs ]
Posted by vikram (Member # 98) on :
kovacs! checkit. no anime version available as yet.
Posted by jnhoj (Member # 286) on :
""Music writer and columnist Miss AMP investigates why certain games, including extreme sports games, appeal mostly to women." "
Extreme sports games...appeal mostly to women?
I think Acclaim's marketing department might disagree! Or indeed anyone, what a bizarre title!
I also agree with ukresistance about ngj.
[ 30.01.2006, 14:57: Message edited by: jnhoj ]
Posted by Bandy (Member # 12) on :
That white one will go nicely with your iPod, won't it, Bandy? It plays games, by the way.
Posted by MiscellaneousFiles (Member # 60) on :
*
[ 10.02.2006, 12:32: Message edited by: MiscellaneousFiles ]
Posted by scrawny (Member # 113) on :
quote:Originally posted by Fionnula the Cooler: That white one will go nicely with your iPod, won't it, Bandy? It plays games, by the way.
Ha ha! You're funny! Posted by Fionnula the Cooler (Member # 453) on :
Is this why there are no arguments on the forum any more? Because if you take the piss out of a forum regular, you might offend their forum girlfriend, boyfriend, bestfriend or whoever else their offence-beneficiary happens to be?
[ 18.02.2006, 14:11: Message edited by: Fionnula the Cooler ]
Posted by jnhoj (Member # 286) on :
Yeah scrawny, FUCK OFF
Posted by Fionnula the Cooler (Member # 453) on :
I hope Scrawny sees what you did there. Posted by Bandy (Member # 12) on :
Actually, that was me - I guess Scrawny was still logged in on the home machine. But, erm, let that be a lesson to you. You scamp.
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
my DS just broke. One of the struts that holds the screen onto the body just appeared to have sheared off, so now the screen is half hanging off. I haven't got the receipt for it either. My life is a mess.
Posted by not... (Member # 25) on :
that sucks
Posted by H1ppychick (Member # 529) on :
where did you get it? the manufacturer may be able to track it via the serial number and you might be able to get it replaced/repaired under warranty that way. also if you bought it on a credit card you might try to use the statement as proof of purchase and see what they say.
best of luck anyway.
Posted by omikin (Member # 37) on :
have you tried turning it off and on again?
Posted by jnhoj (Member # 286) on :
benway, get in touch with nintendo about, more than likely they'll send you a reconditioned one free of charge
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
Sony: not quite up to speed on that whole 'marketing to girl gamers' thing yet.
Posted by Thorn Davis (Member # 65) on :
I saw that exact same ad on the tube yesterday, and it really put me off buying a PSP, a product I'd previously considered paying for. It's such a lame piece of comedic observation. You could almost hear the marketing twit going "And isn't it annoying... yeah... when... yeah... your girlfriend is... you know... asking you questions! Like 'What's the next stop?' and... other questions." Hello? Is that Sony? 1992 called and they want their joke back.
Anyway, I think it's just to make nerds feel better about spending even more time playing games - they can pretend it's because they've got a girlfriend that they spend all their time playing games, rather than because they spend all their time playing games, they haven't got a girlfriend.
edit: dang - there was a than/that violation and you missed it.
[ 13.03.2006, 10:45: Message edited by: Thorn Davis ]
Posted by ben (Member # 13) on :
ESCAPE FROM YOUR GIRLFRIEND'S POINTLESS DEMANDS FOR A BABY. Posted by dang65 (Member # 102) on :
quote:Originally posted by Thorn Davis: edit: dang - there was a than/that violation and you missed it.
If people are starting to correct their own than/that paradox examples then my work here is done. No one ever did explain why it happens so often, but in the symphony of typed words that makes the internet than/that is a commonly played wrong chord. Or something.
Posted by New Way Of Decay (Member # 106) on :
quote:Originally posted by London:
We have that cardboard poster above our front door. For some reason.
*just thought about it - I know the reason now and it isn't legal.
Posted by London (Member # 29) on :
Because you stole it?
Posted by New Way Of Decay (Member # 106) on :
No, no stealing is ok, unless it's water balloons of course. The measurements. Someone wanted the measurements so that they could press up their own advertisements and replace the originals on the tube. I know these to last about 4 seconds though.
Posted by Darryn.R (Member # 1) on :
quote:Originally posted by London:
If they made a huge one of those for on the wall opposite the platform on the underground it'd look like an advert saying 'jump in front of this train'
And it's sexyist.
[ 13.03.2006, 12:20: Message edited by: Darryn.R ]
Posted by Thorn Davis (Member # 65) on :
quote:Originally posted by Darryn.R:
quote:Originally posted by London:
If they made a huge one of those for on the wall opposite the platform on the underground it'd look like an advert saying 'jump in front of this train'
lol. Very true.
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
they've already had to ban one of these adverts for that very reason. look!
[ 13.03.2006, 12:28: Message edited by: Dr. Benway ]
Posted by Dr. Benway (Member # 20) on :
I would say that you couldn't make it up, but Darryn just did.
![[Frown]](frown.gif)
As it is, I drank one beer and stared at a candle until I fell asleep.
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
![[Roll Eyes]](rolleyes.gif)
![[Mad]](mad.gif)
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
thanks for being so positive. Remember that anyone apart from "me", "talking", is usually in a different font to indicate that they're illiterate geeks for me to laugh at and sympathise with... LOL.![[Wink]](wink.gif)
