How to make the most epic Zelda climax even more epic

So I was listening to the "Inception" soundtrack one day and started picturing "The Legend of Zelda: the Wind Waker" to appropriate parts. And now I am on YouTube. I realized this video was well within my abilities and just had to do it. I've been thinking a lot about the series, frequenting Zelda Dungeon and Kotaku, and altogether trying to collect my thoughts about everything gaming so that I can start a blog to share them publicly. Hopefully I can make good progress in that area, as this is sure to garner some attention (I hope). Afterwards maybe I can make more videos.

Post Revision & Anime

Post fix 1: I have finished editing (probably not for the last time) my recent piece about sophistication according to base complexity and definition. I apologize for what was originally a confusing log of the evolution of my thought process and encourage you to read the revision.

Post fix 2: I was scrolling through the list of my posts, feeling nostalgic for the time I would casually blog whatever I was thinking about from a recent experience, when I found this. I immediately realized it needs some followup, for I have seen two animes. Here's the update.

S.C. was one day watching something on YouTube which he told me was the first episode of a space-western anime. After hearing how a friend had told him about it and another one in a conversation most simply put as "stuff like Firefly," and having had a glimpse of the exposition, I decided to use my spare time to check it out.

My curiosity could not have prepared me for the experience. Trigun was fascinating enough to make me set aside my repulsion from the general style and put up with the outrageous moments of anime as I knew it; and as I watched each episode, these feelings dissolved into an appreciation for the art and an acceptance of the silliness as a quality of the characters I grew to love. This may not have happened if the show wasn't tame compared to my previous exposures to anime (the stereotypical ridiculousness was never in the form of bad drama/action), and it was certainly aided by the simple philosophical intrigue offered by the wandering protagonist.

You are introduced to a cornball but highly skilled marksman with an unknown past, hunted and feared by all for something that apparently warrants a sixty billion dollar (double dollar, technically) reward for his capture. The first episode sets the stage for a season of exploits that tease and slowly reveal who this man is, as well as where and when the show is set. Vash the Stampede is known to show up at a random town and obliterate the entire place; but in this trail of destruction people forget the absurd fact that nobody ever dies. Following him around, you quickly see that he is not the monster everyone thinks he is. He foils the wicked, escapes the impossible, and helps everybody to a childlike extreme without his name passing as more than a rumor.

But what starts off simple and lighthearted becomes deep and mysterious as Vash's past hunts him down better than any bounty hunter. Through most of the season, revelations are given in the form of things to question, and everything is woven together by the end with extremely well-written flashbacks of things you had and hadn't seen before. The philosophical (and even theological!) spikes in an enormous sci-fi tale told from the crux backwards as Vash moves forwards. I was amazed.

And I eagerly turned to Cowboy Bebop, the counterpart among fans, which is more like Firefly than Trigun. I no longer had to take anime quirks in stride because this show steered clear of them. The art outdid itself, and the content was all over the place and awesome all the way.

Spike Spiegel and company are bounty hunters ("cowboys") trying to snag a living in outer space, shooting to bring in the wanted but usually ending up involved in much more than they intended. Typically they set things straight and honest where they would not have considered it their business and come up shorthanded where they insist it matters; they're like a small gang of Han Solos.

The show at large follows the various misadventures of this bunch; but while there is little of a unifying plot, the world is pleasantly knitted together. The writers achieve a delicate presentation that gives pieces of a whole without overtly assembling them. One scenario will provide information that another references for different reasons, and both treat it like common knowledge. The characters know the whole so you can take it for granted, and this works wonderfully.

Such coherence makes way for the complex crossing of paths between the characters as each makes a personal journey reconciling their past with their future. The true beauty of Cowboy Bebop is this collective dynamic, this band of friends traveling different roads through an evolving fellowship with each other. It masterfully portrays the joint individuality and universality of human life while exploring countless topics and situations.

(The show's one failing is how explicit the content can be at times. On top of the language and rather bloody shootouts, it very bluntly portrays a decadent culture that could be implied without showing some guy's collection of erotica plastered on the wall, bursting in on a pair of gays when trying to track down their crime boss, etc. This kind of thing varies from the odd camera angle to what is essentially a brief topless shot for plot purposes. View with discretion; if you can see Firefly, you can watch this.)

So, as always, the stereotypical conceals unique excellence. I am not specifically an anime fan, but two of the best TV shows I have seen are anime. Somebody told me these came from the golden age of anime and most programs these days are garbage; considering the decline I have witnessed in American kids' shows and cartoons, I believe it.

SMB2 Inception

You've all seen Inception, right? You've all played Super Mario Bros. 2, right? You realize the connection is better inferred for oneself than explained, right? Behold a 20-second video and an original cartoon on the subject!

Reality Isn't Virtual Enough

Well, now that I have time to blog that coincides with the internet connection working and my brother not using the computer, I've got something interesting to post.



It seems Microsoft decided to top the Wii as far as interactivity. Other videos show different features and ways they are put to use, but I have a comment about what is shown in this particular one. I think it points to a problem with our society.

The designer in the video stressed two things: the ability to hold a relationship with this virtual person, and how lifelike the system is. My first thought (or perhaps second, after "wow") was: "Why not meet someone in real life?" We (as a culture) don't interact with our fellow man enough, and when we do it is far too often through some online organization. It's rather ironic that the activities with Milo are, or at least can be, so organic. And if one can recognize the value of such experiences, they ought to put the stress on reality, this incredible, nonfictional world in which we live. It reminds me of parts of the movie Wall-E ; such as the moment when two of the computer-rules-their-lives people realize there's an amazing life to take part in, if they simply turned off their screens and looked around; or the captain's utter fascination with farming, dancing, and other activities familiar to the human race back on Earth long ago.

Of course, a common opinion is likely to be that Milo "cares about you, no matter what" and is "a friend without problems." The appeal of this idea is dangerous, to be frank. It is not wise to attach yourself to someone who, artificial intelligence notwithstanding, is not real. As God made us a social people, we are here to walk together.

I'm not saying the technology is bad. Indeed, it is my hope that it will serve as an awakening, a reminder of the importance of these things. As for Milo himself, you can have as much fun with him as you like; just never forget that his existence is a fantasy.

If C3PO Talked Like Dr. Suess...

"I would not be flown here or there, I would not be flown anywhere! I do not like to fly, oh no, I do not like to, Han Solo!"

"Wockets? In our pockets? We're in danger! I must tell the others -- OH NO! I'M IN SOCKS!!"

"They're heading in this direction. What are we going to do? We'll be sent to the waiting place and wait for who knows what!"

"We'll have no more of this 'Obi-Wan Kenobi' gibberish! And don't talk to me of your hunch either!"

Stick-Figure Anime

I was hanging out with ZMaro today, talking about random stuff, when the topic of anime emerged. I've never cared for anime-style cartoons or video game cutscenes, because they're so.......weird. The way characters don't move their mouths in accordance with their speech, the manner in which they move their bodies, the corny "camera" attention and facial expressions -- ugh. And when they are fighting and zoom at each other, yelling like drunk teenagers as the world streams by in multi-colored lines, the sweat drips down their faces, and there's a close-up of a guy whose eyes are growing bigger and bigger as his mouth twitches in the same spot for five secondsandthenBAAMMMM!!! the guy flies 40 feet backward and slams into a wall so hard the bricks shatter and he's stuck there; that is, only until he's through acting totally unrealistic for a short piece of dialogue, at which point he flies off the wall and does the same to his opponent. Who would watch such stuff??

ZMaro said he finds anime hilarious because it's so dumb. It's only good purpose is being an object to make fun of. I jokingly pointed out that it also serves as proof that we who can only draw stick-figures are better artists than many Japanese people. "Anime? Blech. I can draw STICK-FIGURES!"

When we began making silly doodles as a result of that conversation and ZMaro drew a stick man planting a gargantuan fist into another stick man, I suddenly had a brilliant idea: stick-figure anime! If we ever become good enough artists to make good animations, we'll create a series with characters doing all those stupid anime moves and pulling those corny expressions in what is supposed to be some great, dramatic moment -- in STICK-FIGURE STYLE!!

I think too much.

My brother and I watched some behind-the-scenes features for Raiders of the Lost Ark lately. The movie-makers encountered some difficulty filming the scenes with the snakes in the Well of Souls, because the snakes didn't behave the way they wanted. There was a clip of Spielberg holding a snake and talking to it, saying, "You like fire? You love fire... In the script you're supposed to hate fire. Why do you like fire? You're ruining my movie!"

I thought, "Well, yeah, they're cold-blooded. Fire would be a source of heat." Then I started thinking about the probability of the situation in the first place. Here we have a temple that's been buried for hundreds or thousands of years, and it's filled with snakes. Why would it be filled with snakes? Being cold-blooded, the Well of Souls would not be an ideal place to live. It's underground, providing insulation from the heat of the desert. When Sallah looked into it, his line should not have been "Why does the floor move?" If there were any snakes there, they would not have been moving. The temple would have been a hibernation ground, or something.

"You're thinking!" my brother said. "You're thinking! Stop thinking!" Hey, at least I don't think this much when I'm actually watching a movie, or I wouldn't enjoy movies.

Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics

I'm sure there are many of you out there who watch movies and nitpick, not the plot lines, but the physics. Well, here are some really smart physicists who give summaries of movies mixed with scientific explenations of why things wouldn't work. This site goes into a lot of detail on the small number of movies they currently list, and it's a good place to learn something and get a laugh at the same time.

I AM WINDOWS. I AM PERFECT.

WARNING: SPOILERS!



I saw the Star Trek Original Series (the remastered version, technically) episode "The Changeling" lately, in which the Enterprise encounters a computer probe designed to destroy, or "sterilize," all that is imperfect. Being impervious to everything they have to throw at it, Kirk and his crew manage to survive for a while because the probe thinks Captain James Kirk is Jackson Roykirk, its one-time creator. However, Nomad, the probe, eventually learns that although Kirk is his creator, he is also an imperfect "biological unit." Just when Nomad deactivates the ship's life support, Kirk finds a way to defeat the computer. He reveals Nomad's mistake of his identity, and that, coupled with the errors that Nomad did not recognize its mistake nor correct it by "sterilization," compelled the machine to eradicate itself on the grounds that it was imperfect.

Nomad didn't do this easily, of course. Its voice generators went screwy and it kept repeating "ERROR ... ERROR...." This made me think of the computers we have today, about how crummy they can be. Specifically, I found myself wondering how long it took people in the Star Trek universe to get past such annoyances as we have today. I can just imagine a Windows Nomad: "I AM WINDOWS. I AM PERFECT." And then Kirk convinces it to destroy itself: "PROCESSING. ESTIMATED TIME REMAINING: 3 MINUTES ... 6 MINUTES ... .73 HOURS.... WINDOWS REQUESTS USER VERIFICATION."

Don't beam the thing into deep space to explode, Kirk, beam it to Bill Gates' office.