Diary of a Madman

Truly, this is a powerful indictment of the Beijing Games.  *cough*

So, sometimes non-sequitors take on a life of their own. From a discussion earlier today with Zack in which we were discussing the intimidating nature of Benedict the XVI, comes a film (and its sequel) in the same vein as Battle Pope that is guaranteed to only piss off 1/6 of the world’s population.

I give you, “Untitled Pope Project.”

Lucas says: If any pope is equipped to fight off Mecha-Hitler, it’s this one. He can denounce his past in a heroic, moving scene with Bruckheimer-esque music before dueling Mecha-Hitler on a careening Pope-mobile.

A clumsy, glasses wearing bishop can be driving and making comedic quips as they dodge oncoming traffic while the two combatants are trading blows on the bubble top.

Zack says: I’m assuming that the Pope is using a combination shield and one of those smoking incense burners as a mace, whereas Mecha-Hitler is obviously throwing swastika ninja stars at him.

Lucas says:  Finally, the Pope spots his chance approaching quickly and, in a swift maneuver, drops to his back and kicks Mecha-Hitler backwards, skewering him on a low hanging flag pole as they drive past.
Pope: Get thee behind me…Adolph.

*cut to Mecha-Hitler, spasming fitfully, as he looks down and sees an American flag jutting from his chest*

MH: Me-Mein…Lieben! *dies*

*fade out, as the American anthem weaves into the background rock music*

*credits roll as Aerosmith starts playing*
/blockbuster off

Zack says:Nice. What’s the sequel about?

Lucas says:  Well, you gotta ramp it up…bigger, flashier…so I’d probably bring in the Anti-Christ…got to have a secret cabal trying to give birth to him…let’s see…Muslims are the big draw right now…

Zack says: Hmm… needs some big names… Mel Gibson? He’s got the whole Passion of the Christ cred…

Lucas says: Oh…I know! The Pope is warned by the final survivor of the Knight Templars of the Endtimes…he has been observing a splinter group of Opus Dei (worked for Dan Brown!) trying to locate the final fragments of the True Cross, which, if brought together and used in a Evil Ceremony will mark a child with the Sign of the Beast!

The pieces are thought to be in the mountains of eastern Afghanistan, and under the Vatican itself!

So, the Pope, accompanied by a crack Swiss Guard strike team parachute into Afghanistan where they meet up with friendly Northern Alliance soldiers…

But…it’s a trap! Osama Bin Laden has the piece and used it to embody the power of Evil into the hijackers responsible for 9/11 (the power of Evil CAN melt steel)…

So, after an epic fire fight, the Pope and his surviving guard (one of whom is a sexy Swiss mercenary with a torn flak vest–cleavage!) take off to the mountains where they engage in various action packed adventures.

Finally, they corner Bin Laden…and the pope and he begin their gun-kata-esque duel. Imagine a swirling melee…nothing but purple ermine stole and a turban flashing around in a circle in a hurricane of blows!

Zack says: AH… but the pope, in the spirit of forgiveness, doesn’t kill Bin Laden. He just wrecks his dialysis machine, leaving him for God’s justice.

Lucas says: Finally, the Pope spots his chance, and, grabbing the grenade thrown to him by Sexy Swiss Guard, stuffs it down Bin Laden’s pants…
Lucas says:
Bin Laden looks up, horror-stricken, to see the pin on the Pope’s finger…

*KABOOM!*

Pope: Rest in pieces, my son.

Zack says: lol…

Lucas says: All seems well…but then a frantic call comes in from the Vatican! Treachery! The Vatican has been seized by Archbishop O’malley. Angered by his harassment after the child sex scandal in Boston, he has sold his soul to Evil for a chance at ultimate power…

Supported by his crack North Korean Kill Squad of pre-pubescent boys…he has seized the Vatican, and the fragment of the cross under the basilica…

There he begins the ceremony, aided by the Dark Priests of Opus Dei. Luckily, the Pope is able to radio a US patrol nearby, and using his top secret clearance and pull orders an evac and jet for him and his team.

Aided by a SEAL team, the pope speeds to the Vatican…

Meanwhile, we get a montage of scenese…the dark ceremony progressing…the cardinals locked in a central chamber, praying for aid, and the Pope, no longer playing games, and who is kitting himself out with explosives, a combat knife, multiple handguns and a flamethrower. His team does likewise.

Scared trooper: I-I don’t know if I can do this, Pope…
Pope: You can, my son…the time to turn the other cheek has passed…now it’s time to kick some ASS.

*Bruckheimer music begins*
Pilot: 30 seconds!
The Pope and his team line up at the back of the plane…the light flashes red, and they leap out…a HALO jump!

Zack says: *is imagining this with puppets ala Team America World Police*

Lucas says: The Pope, wearing a soot blackened mitre and goggles, grimaces as he holds his flamethrower in one hand and pulls the rip cord with his other…

They sail silently into the Vatican, and then the killing begins.

Non-descript North Korean boy-guards start flailing as bullets strike them from the nearly invisible strike team…

They rush into the basilica only to be met by a line of North Korean guards, weapons levelled.

NK: Drop your weapons, Great Satan!
Pope: You dare profane this place?
NK (getting nervous): D-Drop your weapons! We’ll fire!
Pope: Fire? Don’t mind if I do, my son.

*The Pope unleashes a hellish torrent of napalm on the guards, turning them into human torches*

Zack says:Dude… the mitre HAS to be a secret weapon.

Lucas says: Good call.

The team rushes into the building, past the smoldering corpses.

Meanwhile, underneath the building, dark rumblings begin as the Opus Dei priests scream and cavort to summon their dark god.

The Pope pauses in his rush, and blanches…he knows what’s happening.
Pope (to the strike team): Find the Cardinals…I’ll take care of O’malley.

Sexy Swiss Girl: No! We must protect you! You cannot do this alone!
Pope: I’m not alone…I have 1 billion who fight at my side…*inspirational music begins*…from the smallest child, to the oldest woman. We fight for what is right…for life…for freedom…I won’t lose this battle…not for them…not now…

*tears slide down Sexy Swiss Girl’s cheeks*

SSG: I’m coming with you!
Pope: No…you are needed here…this is something I must do…it’s time to kick ass and chew communion wafers…and I’m all out of wafers.

*team rushes off*

SSG: I won’t forget you…
Pope: You won’t have to.

*wipe*

Zack says: lol… Duke Popem’

Lucas says: The ceremony downstairs is picking up in speed…the walls are shaking…unearthly howls echoing throughout the vast vaults…

The pope rushes down the staircases, practiced eye watching for enemies…suddenly several Opus Dei burst around the corner, eyes wide…as if they’re running AWAY from something…

They freeze as they see the Pope…then they raise their weapons. The Pope lets out a burst of fire which leaves them charred rags…

He runs down more corridors until he bursts into a great vault…and into a scene of horror…

A vast demonic form, vaguely resembling O’malley stands hunched in the middle…corpses of NK guards, faces locked in a rictus of fear surround him…Opus Dei priests are backing away from him, screaming obscene commands in a long forgotten language.

With contemptuous ease the demon picks up one and rips him in half. The Pope narrows his eyes and the demon turns as it disembowls the last Opus Dei.

Demon: So…the little fly has returned…I am the Alpha and the Omega! I am the future! The Church is mine now…and the world will burn to a cinder under my dark shadow!

Pope: You always were ambitious, O’malley…but to seek out this evil? I cherish life, my son…but I’ll make an exception for you.

The Pope unleashes his flamethrower and the demon roars, batting away the puny flame with huge one gore-soaked fist. Yelling out a psalm, the Pope drops the flamethrower and pulls out two silver Desert Eagle pistols, upon which are etched matching crosses.

Zack says:*imagines this scene like something out of Devil may Cry*

Lucas says: He leaps through the air in slow-motion, guns firing akimbo. The demon roars and backhands him, sending him slamming into a gold inscribed chest.

Pope: The Ark? I forgot we had this down here…
The demon slams the pope across the room into a bookcase of musty scrolls…

Demon: You just had to interfere, didn’t you? Always interrupting! No more, Pope…this time there will be no salvation…
Demon: God cannot help you now…say your prayers, Papa…
The Pope stares up at the demon, eyes hard and unrelenting.
Pope: You have shamed yourself, O’malley…and you have shamed the Church…no longer.

The demon raises its meaty fists in a mighty blow, and the Pope, eyes slightly wistful, looks upward, before ripping off his mitre in a smooth movement, and twisting the small cross on top…a foot of silvery steel extends out of the top, and with a mighty throw, the Pope sends the spear-crowned mitre deep into the demon’s throat…

Demon (gurgling): You think that’s enough to defeat me?Pope: You always were slow, O’malley…

A high-pitched sound begins emanating from the mitre, and the demon’s eyes widen…

Pope: Go with God, my son.

The demon shrieks and tries to pull out the spear, but it’s too late…

A vast explosion rips through the vault, sending the Pope sailing backwards, followed by a fireball…the Swiss Guards look back as they are guiding the limping, injured Cardinals out of the basilica in a fleeing tide.

SSG: Oh no….

Swiss Guard Leader: I’m sure he got out…he’s the Pope..if anyone can survive that, he can.

Fires leap up to the heavens…the whole building is ablaze…
Emergency crews rush up, ambulances, fire fighters start appearing…there is chaos and pandemonium…SSG watches the flames, her face pale in the yellow light…

The other guards start to turn away, tears in their eyes…

A voice suddenly shouts, “Look!” A form is visible in the fiery building…Bruckheimer music kicks in as the SEAL team/EMS crews, and Swiss Guard begin cheering.

The Pope, robes burnt almost off, muscled torso exposed, stumbles out of the inferno, the fragment of the true cross in his blackened hand.

Zack says: Hmm…. “robes burnt almost off, muscled torso exposed” … are we talking pope thong here?

Lucas says: Perhaps a flash…it’s purple and emblazoned with gold crosses.

Zack says: eeewww

The SSG lets out of a sob and runs to him, embracing him tightly…the crowd follows her, like a tide…the Pope smiles…and the scene pulls back…showing the burning building and the fire crews spraying water into the fire.

Scene wipes…

We are in a rebuilt basilica…the Pope is holding a service…

The Swiss Guard are looking fit and heroic in full uniform manning the entrances and walls. Sexy Swiss Girl is standing by a pillar near the Pope…she winks at him when his gaze passes over her…

The crowd murmurs along with the Pope’s words…suddenly a man in black surreptitiously enters and seats himself near the front…

He looks like your typical g-man, and is holding a folder marked top-secret…the folder is emblazoned with the words “The Atlantis Mystery.” The Pope notices this, and heaving a long, drawn out sigh, continues his sermon.

The guards start to laugh softly, and the Bruckheimer music kicks in. The camera pulls back, out of the basilica to the outside grounds, where military choppers have started to land, and a command tent is being set up…

The End?!

Zack says: lol..

Lucas says: The lesson here is, don’t get me started on something like this. ;P

Zack says:

Seeing as how I’m stuck indoors, broke, and usually located near a computer screen, I’ve been playing back through my favorite game of the last year, Mass Effect–one more time.  The game does so much so right that it makes the little things, the small failures (and the larger ones) stand out so much obviously.

It’s like watching Aliens, as Ripley descends the elevator into the alien nest, motion sensor plicking, bathed in the warm glow of her flamethrower…except the elevator ride takes 5 minutes and she starts fidgeting and glancing at her watch in boredom.

It hurts us.

What it does right:

•  Fantastic music.  The main theme, when it kicks in 3-4 times during the main quest is fricking epic.  It propels the ending from merely satsifying to orgasmic.
• Great Story/Writing: This is Bioware, so the quality of script should be a given, but it’s still worth mentioning.  Anyone who reads through the VOLUME of background material in-game will realize just how well visualized (if steeped in “it just works, trust us” space opera) the setting is.  The alien races, the locations, the voice acting, all of it screams quality.
• Better combat system than KotOR or Jade Empire.  I’m sure I’m not alone in remembering how you could spam 1-2 abilities in KotOR and win.  Jade Empire was more immersive, but also twitchier.  This system melds a fairly solid Gears of War-esque cover system with a third-person shooting view and manages to bury all of the RPG number crunching under a pretty convincing facade of an action game.
• Ambiance:  I love sci-fi.  Always have, always will.  I love the idea of space travel, and the thrilling impossibility of being the first person to step foot on an alien world.  Mass Effect is obviously a labor of love as well, as it mixes all the tropes of epic sci-fi: the ancient alien precursors, the galactic menace, the fallen hero, the blue alien species with exotic sexual tendencies–they’re all here!  From the sterile cleanliness of the Citadel, to the musty age-rotted remains of Prothean ruins, the whole game feels realized.  It pulls you in, and immerses you into its world in a way that most RPGs never even aspire to.

This, ironically, is also where it stumbles.

The problem with immersive  environments is that it becomes increasingly easy to be ripped out of that illusion of reality by the very limits of their presentation.  For example, the mind-numbingly dull side-missions throughout most of the game (a problem Bioware acknowledges and claims it will fix in the sequel), and the grinding boredom of exploring most of the planets in the game.  Of course, this raises the point that most planets probably are dull, lifeless rocks which are interesting only to geologists and those for a penchant for piping hot magma.  But this is a virtual world, one in which the content is supposed to enrich the player’s experience.

This is something that trying to drive my damn rover over a two thousand foot vertical escarpment to reach that last goddamn mining node simply does not do.

This illusion is shattered by other problems: the similar buildings one encounters on these planets (apparently one race has a monopoly on the interstellar Tuff Shed equivalent), and the lack of diversity in enemies, as well as a paucity in mission types.  Most of these revolve around retrieving something (”save my kitty/data disc/genomic research!”), killing someone (”Sorry, I have to kill you, that lady over there said you were bad, don’t try to argue.”), or killing someone to retrieve something (”I killed the bad man and saved your kitty!”).  This is surprising, since I remember a much greater diversity in mission types in KotOR, from defending your comrade in court, to investigating a murder (”Your witness, Mr. Jedi”), and even playing up a Romeo and Juliet crime family drama (or even better, watching both sides off each other).

Bioware has promised to rectify this lack of quest options in the next game, and I respect the incredible achievement they have made in terms of presentation, graphics (although the 360 chugs at times), and immersion.  But by reaching so high, Bioware have also made evident the cliches and creaky baggage the genre carries with it. It is my hope that with the next iteration of the game that they can evolve the mechanics of the game to match the world they have created.

In any case, it’s still my favorite RPG of all time, epic elevator rides be damned.

好久不见…

Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve updated this blog. Since September I’ve graduated, and my concerns have shifted radically from writing my thesis and worrying about money to finding a job and worrying about money. In any case, I’ve been bitten by the writing bug again (hopefully it’s that, and not West Nile Virus, which has found a home in our fair sandy state) and I’ll do my best to keep this site up to date.

I’ve been fairly anti-social as of late, and, being broke, I’ve turned to cheaper entertainment than driving into town and seeing all my friends and acquaintances, who probably think me dead. Instead I’ve been reading, trying to catch up on months worth of movies that I’ve missed, and playing whatever games I’ve had lying around. I apologize to everyone who invited me to go out…trust me, I haven’t forgotten you, and once I have enough money to buy food I’ll take you all out to a well deserved lunch!

Till then, it’s good to be back, and I hope you’re all doing well.

I’ve been thinking a lot about the past and the future lately.  The former slips into my mind at random times–memories of friends, relationships, the fun times and the not-so-fun alike.  It can be hard to contextualize memories, I think.  All too often we live and experience things without assigning them any meaning in our lives.  The result can be a procession of faces and names, lives that we have touched in some small way, even if only in passing.  I think the greatest ability humanity possesses is our capacity for self-delusion–either through ignorance of the self-evident, or willful blindness of the vastness of creation and the intricacy of what we are a part of.

This isn’t a rambling drug-induced “Oh wow man, like the universe is so big” sentiment, although a healthy appreciation for scale does wonders for an inflated ego, but rather a reflection on our inability to agree to anything on this dust ball.  I have read a great deal of speculative fiction–especially of the science fiction bent.  I love science fiction in that it (good sci-fi anyway) explores the human condition through the prism of technology.  What is the soul, if human consciousness can be stored digitally?  How is the innate sense of self of a sentient being shaped by our surroundings?  I thrive on this stuff, hence my reference towards thinking of the future.

I think this kind of speculation reflects the best part of human nature–the optimistic and eternally curious drive towards the unknown.  It is also naive, and bereft of the muddy realpolitik of the world as it is–a shiny optimistic borderless space, bereft of the exigencies of the nation-state, the demands of capitalism, and the dirty back room dealings of contemporary politics.  No wonder so many sci-fi utopias are embodied in socialist idealism–part of us longs for a system in which the Darwinian strivings of globalism are left behind, rendered moot by technological development.  Unfortunately, unless humanity undergoes a significant development (hence the deux ex machina of “uplifting” or the “Singularity”), we seem to be stuck with the lesser part of our nature; clumsy, selfish, superstitious, and deadly afraid of upsetting the status quo.  I wonder if we can ever build towards a future of partnership, when we can’t even agree on the definition of murder, or the basic rights to be accorded to a human being.

Well, I knew that I’d pay the price eventually for not keeping up my Chinese studies, and it looks like the bill has arrived.  The Chinese class I’m taking (ironically the last class I have to take) has driven home the point that when it comes to speaking or writing the language, I’m as close to useless as one can be.  I can understand most of what I hear, and write well enough when given a computer, but when I have to generate characters on my own, I feel like an absolute idiot.

Needless to say, this has been discouraging–akin to getting a degree in advanced mathematics, and then realizing that you forgot how to perform simple Algebra.  The simple act of writing a sentence (especially when I *know* the words) when I forget every other character simplifies my speech into that of a 2 year old, and reduces my topics to those I covered in first year classes.  I hope that things improve, otherwise…I don’t know.  I do know I probably deserved this though–I wonder why I had to wait to begin slacking off in college until grad school, it would have been far more convenient to almost fail my first two semesters like everyone else.

In happier news, Stranglehold comes out today.  I know the camera controls are iffy, and the difficulty ramps up later on, but I’m still looking forward to it for some nostalgic reason.  It brings back memories of watching HK action flicks from the late 80s-90s and caters to that part of me which longs for a secluded, dank back-alley in Kowloon with a dingy bar full of expendable toughs to take out in a balletic display of violence.  Where has that world gone to?

This looks like so much fun, but can you imagine the lawsuits in America?   And kids here complain about riding the bus…

One of my greatest weaknesses is my tendency to get distracted from things.  In an academic setting this can be exacerbated by the sheer amount of interesting things around me.  For example, the other day I spent part of the morning looking for articles to use in my forthcoming thesis.  While found 9-10 of those, I also found a fascinating article on the role China played in the collapse of the Soviet Union, and proceeded to spend the next hour finishing it up.

The most egregious example of this was a few months ago when I took a break from some work and pulled down a book from a nearby shelf (the personal diary of Joseph. P. Stillwell) and proceeded to lose two days in it.  Must maintain focus!

In any case–the proposal has been approved, the topic is a go (from two sources, and much of the foundation has been laid.  What does all of this mean?  The time of the thesis is at hand.  Finally, after several years of indecision and hair pulling, I am on track to get this thing done.

Now, uh…just to write it.

I set myself a schedule, and it’ll be interesting to see how close I come to following it.  Writing, like any creative endeavor isn’t an exact science–sometimes I get stuck for several days on a certain theme or example, and other times I write 7-8 pages in a single afternoon of academic exultation.  The thesis is basically three term papers (in length) squashed together under a unifying topic and addressing a single question.  The difficulty will lie in two areas, I think: presenting the background of the issue (my specific topic is a relatively new one, and the material is likewise recent and diverse–this isn’t like writing a paper on Du Fu), and in my examples.  I have many of them, but I’m not sure I have enough of the underlying issues which motivate them and tie them to my specific modus operandi.  If I can overcome these problems, I don’t see why I can’t hammer out most of this thing in the next month or two.

Here’s hoping anyway.

I had one of those great unanticipated moments yesterday.  Package arrives (nothing I ordered, I was sure) from UPS, I grab it, go inside and slice it open to reveal–horror of horrors–giant ravenous white bunny slippers!  Love is sending someone across the planet Monty Python carnivorous rabbit slippers.  Thanks, sweetie.

So now I walk around the house clad in two furry boots, each possessing a maw frozen in a rictus of insatiable blood lust.  Does it get any better?

Zack, being the great guy he is came down on Saturday to install RAM and my new hard drive.  The RAM is great (alt-tabbing and opening programs is noticeably faster), but the HDD is the star of the show, and I have been on a downloading orgy since Sunday.  Needless to say, since then 20GB of the drive has been consumed, and as for the rest, well, it’s only a matter of time.

Something else of note.  Giant ants.  They exist, they’re out there, and apparently only a group of poorly trained cannonfodd–er…the Earth Defense Force…ahem, can save us all.  I wouldn’t have believed it, but apparently gunning down hordes of giant insects and in the process flattening an unfortunate city (cue the NPC cry of “My city!  My family!” as we lob a hail of grenades onto an orphanage) is incredibly cathartic.  So much so that we spent at least 4 hours saving the world.

If they ever construct a monument to those who died due to insect predations–say a giant boot squashing an arachnid–they’d better build a larger one in memorial to the hundreds of our companions who fell in the line of our fire–er… duty.  Seriously Zack, you are to teammates what this is to small rodents.