Video Game

Happy Thursday! Finally got some summery type weather in here, and it's a welcome change. It's nice to be able to open windows again.

Guess who I share a birthday with? I just found out today. Give up? Ventura. Well that's that this book says. The internet says April 1 and also March 9. SHUSH, THE INTERNET THIS TIME YOU'RE WRONG OKAY. So Ventura is 121 years older than me!

Arbortown adventure was fun. It ended up just being me and Carolyn and Beth, but we were a party and claimed the wilderness for Spain Narnia ourselves. I took careful notes on the map because it was highly useless before I added points of interest.

Such points include Monsters! Wishing Pond, Engelmann Secret Base, Bats, chickens, Pokeweed, Abbey Road, and Kangaroons. Next time you go to the Arboretum, I'll show you all the hot spots.

The rest of my week has been FFXIII, sleeping, and trying to wake up in time to go to work. Tomorrow I go at 4 so I think I'm good today.

FFXIII, in this last week, has taken 40 hours of my time. And now I'm at the point where I feel like it'll take 40 more. See, now, this thing is separated into "chapters" -- and let me tell you, that's only the beginning of its literary merit. And by literary I mean artistic, and by artistic I mean this video game (and indeed others) should be recognized as valid expressions of art. A crazy interactive hybrid of narrative cinema and strategic button mashing.

This is not a segue, it's an example: Remember how in The Wizard of Oz, the beginning was in black and white and then at one point it switches to color? That could be (and sounds like, as described there) a purely technical observation, a statement on types of film stock. But also remember that this transition occurs in beat with the narrative, at the point where Dorothy leaves her old life behind and wakes up in this strange new land. Now, you have the information in your grasp to transform this technical observation into critical analysis: Kansas life is dull and average, literally colorless. Step into the vibrant world of Oz, the change in film stock is shocking and ultimately a story-driven effect.

The artistic concept of form enhancing function -- the HOW it's said effecting the WHAT that's being said -- you can find this technique anywhere, not just in filmmaking. In Enchanted she literally goes from a storybook cartoon world into gritty 3-D New York.
Poems about

f
a
l
l
i
n
g leaves

or w i d e o p e n s p a c e s. You get the idea.

So remember how I mentioned the gameplay of FFXIII left a lot to be desired in terms of player input? How the maps were straight shots, no room to explore; the parties limited to who is available; and how their skill sets progressed one step at a time, this then this then this? In other words, the game came across as highly linear (a shocking break from the open worlds of previous titles in the series).

Guess what? It's all part of the story. If you don't want to know a little about the plot of the game, skip this: These characters are, at every step, being told what to do. Primarily, their very existence dictates that their actions can only lead them to one of two predetermined and pretty horrible fates. Their choice is between worse and worst. They have no options. But get this -- as soon as they decide to buck authority, to decide to forge their own futures, the map, storyline, skill sets, EVERYTHING literally opened wide up. We go instantly from point-A-point-B maps to a huge sprawling vast plainsland with optional quests from which to pick and choose.

I mean, if that's not an artistic choice then I know nothing about art. It's still blowing me away.

That, and that it's literally (so much literal speak today) beautiful, with such lovely graphics and people what look like people. Just think, 13 years ago we were playing with top-of-the-line 3D computer graphics...that still rendered characters with fingerless lumps for hands. Now we have this.

Better go get started on my second 40.

-Steph