Monday, September 30, 2013

Video Game Review: Kirby's Adventure (Kirby's Dream Collection: Special Edition) (Nintendo Wii)

Shortly after my first glorious romp with Kirby's Dream Land, I decided to try out Kirby's sole NES outing: Kirby's Adventure. This wasn't really a blind run; when I was a younger soul, maybe twelve or thirteen, a friend purchased Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land for the Game Boy Advance and, being a rabid fan of Kirby 64, I borrowed it. I think I beat the thing by the end of the school day, but I loved every second of it (and I might add, it was the most productive in-school suspension I've ever had). Being a bit of a historian, I was interested in trying out the original. I knew it couldn't possibly be exactly like the remake, so I didn't go into it expecting that.

Actually, it's not too different. Kirby's Adventure doesn't feature the enhanced graphics of its follower, but it isn't ugly or even mediocre. The visuals are superb for the most part, going that extra mile to actually look like something in a time where most things were digital Legos. Kirby's round and got character, and anything he comes up against has a lot of personality.

Unfortunately, the development team went a little overboard attempting to prove that the NES was capable of being pretty. While the environments are lush and character sprites are gorgeous, it's just too ambitious for the NES to handle. Intense flickering drowns out most of the details and is probably a considerable risk for those with epilepsy. I found that it reduced me to a dream-like trance for the majority of the game, making it painful to play and difficult to rationalize. The game also suffers considerable slowdown at a number of parts, and there is at least one ability (Spark) which causes the processing to drag any time it's used. This is a monstrous issue.

Those aren't the only downsides the more-than-adequate graphics create, though. While stage design is damn near brilliant when explored isolated from all its beautifying effects, it really doesn't work out so well in-game. The excessive detailing combined with the NES' limited capacity for colors makes it difficult to tell which objects are foreground and which are background. This issue was present in a number of NES games, so the developers made damn sure the environments were not cluttered with confusing objects. Kirby's Adventure is more cluttered than the average home in Hoarders. Blocks stacked several high, which are drawn exactly like all the usable blocks, litter the backgrounds, some even piled up around foreground objects. This can make predicting jumps a very difficult task, and even with Kirby's unlimited flight ability I still plummeted to my death a couple times.

I can appreciate the attempt at creating a beautiful environment on the NES architecture, and HAL got it right as far as screenshots are concerned. But when everything is moving it just doesn't work, and the results of this one design philosophy have led to an entire game, a game which would have otherwise been phenomenal, being nearly unplayable.

It's not all bad, but I've kind of already hit the subject line: a major, and potentially dangerous, flaw permeates the entire game and absolutely murders the experience.

In the past I've gone on at length about the quality aspects of games, and maybe it's fair for me to go into detail about that here as well. But I really can't find the motivation to. I can't recommend anybody to play this game, despite the great music, great physics, incredible boss battles, and perfect difficulty level (when it plays right). Supposing I should just to be fair, but I don't really have the patience for it, it's an energy suck, and I'm never going to play this game again.

Look, this game was a pretty miserable experience for me. I absolutely loved it from a technical standpoint, because it really is a marvel beside its peers on that scale. As somebody who can appreciate the work that goes into creating something, I can definitely appreciate Kirby's Adventure. But as somebody who's a gamer first, I really have a hard time getting behind this game. It's not fun. It is the perfect argument against the position that games are inherently good based on the tech. specs. alone. Specs. don't make a game, unfortunately.

Kirby let me down with this one. Some people might find it fun, a lot of people find it fun. I don't. I had a few good times, but the overall bad experience really makes any positive aspects negligible. Kirby's Adventure sees itself on the list with five stars. I want to bite it a lot harder, mainly because my head aches for some reason and I've focused only on the negative aspect (and that's seriously coloring my language, wtf), but the good stuff is good enough to push the game into "mediocre" territory. As far as games go, you really could do a lot worse.


--Consider this a note of hesitation. I might revise this review in the future, because it really does not follow my typical review philosophy. Still, everything I've said here is true, and the star rating can only be lowered. Kirby's Adventure will never cross into the "good" or "enjoyable" game spectrum.--

Value Comics and 2-Bit Comics Depth

I thought I should touch on Value Comics and 2-Bit Comics a little bit here, and maybe this will see a reprinted form in the next issue of each book, but I never really made clear what the primary goal behind each title is. In the first issue of 2-Bit Comics, the one which collected Canteen Kate, I wrote a little bit about how I wanted to reintroduce classic titles to the marketplace for the sake of exposure and culture. That's true, and it's still the primary philosophy behind Value Comics.

What I noticed, though, was that printing the books in color drove the prices up to a ridiculous amount. Not just the prices, either. I'm not hiding the fact that this is all stuff done at home and that I'm using CreateSpace to publish and distribute this material. Unfortunately, CreateSpace has a data cap, and I can only upload a maximum of 400 megabytes per book. That might seem like a lot, but when you're dealing with full color 300 ppi images measuring in at about 7.5x10 inches a piece, it adds up fast. As it is, I'm forced into reducing the quality by about 10% during the PDF conversion process, which makes me all kinds of sad inside.

I realized that 2-Bit Comics, while remaining within the reasonable pricing range for collected edition comics, was not the best deal. It's great for getting whole series back out into the marketplace in the best quality that I (and if somebody out there [and I know you are] can do this better than I can, I encourage you to do so) can produce, and that's worth continuing the series. What it's not great for is enticing readers to slap down ten dollars for what amounts to the same as three modern day comic books. With all the work and effort that goes into the newer stuff, it really isn't that great a deal. And the less people there are checking this stuff out, the more expensive it is to be exposed to the material, the less I'm succeeding with enriching the culture.

So I took my toys for a couple months and went home and thought about the best ways to share them. I learned that I could upload them to the Internet Archive, but they were still trapped in cyberspace. That's kind of a big deal. I feel that things have to be available physically, so I don't want them to be stuck in the digital realm. So I thought a lot more. What I came to realize was that removing the color from an image greatly reduces its filesize. Right there I could fit more material into a book. But the price would just grow and grow to monstrous proportions with each additional page (you should see the estimates CreateSpace was giving me when I estimated a color page count for Adolescence. Holy mackeral).

My logic was fault. Black and white pages cost significantly less to print than color pages, something I should have thought about from the start (I was working with the mind that Createspace simply charged a flat page per price, because they like money). So what I'm doing with Value Comics is to print more material for a lesser price, with a slightly reduced experience, in an attempt to reach as wide an audience as possible. I want every individual from every income bracket to be able to enjoy the work which has pretty much served as the foundation for the modern entertainment industry for the past ten or so years.

The other thing about Value Comics is that the stories are not in order. I am not presenting full issue after full issue of one series, I am taking stories from multiple titles and scrambling them into one book. Why am I doing this? Again, it's about the exposure. I like horror, but I'd never touch straight-on romance. I'm not the only person who stays in these narrow niches, and I really want people to break out of that and learn to experience a whole spectrum of material they might not otherwise glance at. While working with the comics, I inevitably read some of the romance comics I was going through (and working primarily with titles from the St. John library means a whole lot of romance), and there is some genuinely great stuff in there. So yeah, there's kind of a bit of trickery to the Value Comics, but I genuinely hope it's for the better. Just think of it like syndicated television. A little o' this, a little o' that (and don't worry, I'll be posting the complete list of titles which originated the material for each issue).

I have been thinking about doing a black and white 2-Bit comic as well, just reprinting the original books at a lower price. That's something I might do in the near future. Likewise, a color version of Value is in the pipeline, although it won't be much of a value at all. This series, tentatively titled "Glory Days", will only be 100 pages in length, and may feature balck and white filler pages. So it's less of a bargain, but the primary reach of that book is for people who want to experience the books in a format closer to what was intended. That won't come around for quite some time though, another year at least, as I'd like to get a large group of ready-to-go material to work with (and unlike Value, it won't have any crossover with 2-Bit. That's an aspect I'm rethinking right now, if I really intend to release black and white 2-Bit editions).

Anyways, I hope this is a clear enough explanation for my motivations behind the two titles and for why they are being presented in such different fashions. I also intend on releasing at least one prose anthology which will collect the text-stories from the comics for those readers who aren't so fond of graphics. Considering going two ways with those. One, that is definitely happening, is a compilation of the scans, including whateve advertisements may happen to occupy the same page as the story. The other road (and the one which will take the longest to accomplish and be the least frequent between my various projects) is to transcribe these stories into usable text documents and print them in a more friendly-looking collection.

And don't worry, I'm still chugging along with my original fiction. I've finally found a schedule that suits me, and I've made remarkable leaps and bounds with my latest story, Dead Kiss, which will probably debut in this year's annual collection. Unfortunately, Mrrda and his relatives have taken a bit of a break while I tool them away from the serial mindset (it really wasn't working for me).

Since I'm crap with endings, I'll close this all out in true Resetti fashion:

Don't forget to brush your teeth, your breath reeks! My nosehairs wilted from here. Got it? Ya hear me? Good. Now
SCRAM!

Sunday, September 29, 2013

Value Comics #1

Value Comics #1 will be released soon (a little late, unfortunately), marking the launch of my new series: Value Comics. The series should live up to its title with each issue being no more than $6.99 US and featuring 250 pages of classic comics. Value is--like its sister series, 2-Bit Comics--printed on full sheets of 8.5x11 paper with a half-inch border on all sides, to assure that no detail is cropped from the page. Value Comics is printed in black and white with a depth of gray hues in some stories.

Stories have been pulled from a variety of genres and titles to increase exposure and give readers the opportunity to explore new material and ideas. These stories have been mixed and mingled and are not organized by title, issue, genre, or creator.

Friday, September 27, 2013

Crossed Off: An Animal Crossing Diary - Day Two

I awake at 8:22 PM. Yesterday's travel and the following confusion must have taken more out of me than I had anticipated. The day is nearly over, and yet my activities have hardly begun. Pushing the questions from my mind, I had Nook's store. It closes at nine, if I remember correctly, so there isn't much time... and a glance at my wallet tells me that I can waste none.

Nook seems enthusiastic as usual about my arrival. He mentions nothing of caring for my abode, or the mysterious appearance of an upper floor and a peculiar picture. Deciding it best not to bring it up, my head still spinning from the reacclimation, I simply draw wares from my pockets. I offer up both the leaf umbrella and the Maki doll, as neither are of use to me or strike my particular fancy. I also inquire about the candies, noting that the abundance of fruit in the village should provide sufficient nutrition. And if worse comes to worse, I can always fish.

He grants a meager 397 for the lot. I shrug. The candy's expired anyway. I jingle the bells in my pockets as I quickly peruse his store, but nothing catches my fancy. Having completed my business, I had out for the town. The bells clang sadly against my thigh. Their lightness startles me, and I realize that I must make more. Utilities are of no consequence in this land but there is always mortgage.

I'm feeling quite tired and too groggy to socialize, so I brush past those who come outside. A pink mouse appears from her home, but I try not to meet her eyes. She's cute though, and unfamiliar. Perhaps I will speak with her later. There is only so long before Nook retires and my revenue is put on hold.

My destination is the beach. If I remember correctly, some of the shells which wash up are quite valuable. Along the way, I am taken aback by the multitude of cherry trees which have dominated one acre. Are such things for eating, or are they here a foreign delicacy? There will be time for that later, for now the beach.

Something twists my ankles as I descend from the high cliff into the dark part of town. With a swear I look down, spotting a ragged patched shirt grappling from the grass. With a sigh, I jam it into my pocket. I'm sure Nook will pay more for this than for any shell.

Without care I stuff my pockets with the shells of dead crustaceans. It never occurs to me not to mingle such things with soft fabric. The stench of the briny deep seems like a thing locked to this place of surf, and not at all a matter which can sink itself into the linens of one's clothes. 

Despite my lack of rod, I can't help but to glance waterward in the hopes of spotting a large shadow swimming my way. I've caught many a coelacanth, you know. Donated one to the museum. The museum, that magical place. I Should drop by later to see how they're doing. Perhaps there are some local critters not yet found.

I find more patched shirts littering the ground and shake my head sadly. I'll have to return for them, as for now my pockets are bursting. With haste I return to Nook, wondering as I do what he uses most of these for. I never see the shells we gather in his shop. Perhaps he offers a specialty catalogue of sorts. What kind of prices could he be charging within? Am I being a fool by failing to recognize an opportunity to begin my own business? No, it isn't so. I am not like Nook, who has others stock his shelves. I have no indebted servants, and I have no bells with which to acquire them.

A cold breeze hits me. I am alone.

While harvesting apples, I am approached by the pink mouse from earlier. There's no avoiding her now. She approaches timidly, and I can see the rehearsal on her lips. With a squeak she taps me on the shoulder and asks about my evening before finally popping the question:

"Say, have we met before, sweetie?"

Like Purrl, this mouse seems not to know me, and yet (and even despite her weak demeanor) she addresses me with such familiarity. Do I maybe look to her like a former lover? A slip of the tongue caused by my ruggedly generic good looks? I feel my cheeks turn rosy at the endearment, but she doesn't seem to mind. I introduce myself, and the girl's nervousness is instantly transformed into blissful energy as she clasps her hands together and exclaims how stoked she is to meet me. After a small exchange of information, she turns and skips away, eyes shut merrily, as though she is having a pleasant dream.

With a relieved sigh, I resume my work. There is not long before the store will close. No time to ponder the oddities of the locals.

After combing the beach clear and vacating all known fruit from the trees, I head to the Lost and Found at the police station. Often they have many items to claim, but today there are only four on the shelves. Odd, I think, since I found dozens of ratty shirts plaguing the village. Also odd is the bug net at the back of the L&F. Such an expensive item is typically not one simply left around. With a shrug I steal it away, eager to make the flip for some cash.

By the end of my night I have earned 83,044 bells. Not bad for my first night back on the town. It all goes into the mortgage. I am broke once more.

But at least I have staved off the savages.

For now.

About "Crossed Off"

"Crossed Off" is something I've been thinking about doing for a while now, mainly becaus Animal Crossing is a game that will utterly consume you when played exclusively, but it's definitely one of my favorites and I've certainly been eager to get back to it. Unfortunately, I don't know to what degree "Crossed Off" will continue. I might just carry on with it for the next couple of days as I reacquaint myself with the village, but it really did make what would have otherwise been a five minute gaming session into an hour-and-a-half one, and more or less sucked the enjoyment out of the game itself. That's not really what I'm interested in doing with games, so I can't say I'll write anymore "Crossed Off" entries. Still, I might, perhaps becoming more brief over time and lumping multiple days worth of events into one entry (in which case, the tense will switch from present to past).

It was pretty fun writing it all out, though. Particularly the introduction, which kind of decided to include some of my overarching theories about Nintendo's franchises. Anyways, I hope you enjoy/ed the little exercise, and keep your breath sufficiently unheld (but your toes crossed) for more.

Crossed Off: An Animal Crossing Diary - Day One

Two years ago I moved to the town of Mayhew. It was a quaint little village located in the heart of a mysterious forest which exists on a dreamy island that seems inaccessible to those who do not arrive via the private train managed by a cult of smiling monkeys who all go by the name of "Porter".  It is my understanding that, contrary to all knowledge of forests and their like, that the trees of this fair island spread further out to encompass many great lands. I would know little of this. Porter's tracks crisscross the entirety of the known world, like chains locking away some terrible truth.

Shortly after my arrival in this village I was summoned away. Important business, you see. I can't reveal anymore than that. Now that I have downtime, I aim to reengage this old community. I hope I have not been forgotten.

Immediately after departing from Porter's train, I am greeted by an odd brown-and-white patched cat who goes by Purrl. I don't remember such a woman from the times before my leaving, but there were many who had come and gone. Perhaps she exists among these fleeting memories. Or perhaps she, like I fear so many others may be, is herself new to this land. Regardless, she seems quite inviting. Perhaps overly trusting. She refers to me familiarly as "Honey". Have I some relationship with this girl? And the heart on her shirt is off putting... I get the feeling she has been standing here a long time, awaiting my return.

Purrl sounds confused. After a glance at her clock, as though I have arrived late for an unscheduled meeting, she informs me of the hour: 3:29 AM. That doesn't sound right. Have I truly been asleep so long? I glance at my phone. No, the girl is off. It is 2:24 AM. She seems flustered, and in her panicked state fumbles with the watch dial. Sweat bounces from her brow like it is raining. After a moment she gives a sigh, looks up at me sheepishly, and says: "Finally. I'm glad that's over with..."

Before I can say anything else she blurts out: "Shall we get started?"

Started? I wonder. Started with what? What nefarious scheme does this bizarre beast have in store for me?

"By the way, what was your name again?" Purrl cocks her head to one side and frowns, placing a paw on her chin thoughtfully.

This cannot be real. She seems so familiar, speaks so intimately, yet I have no memory of her and she, evidently, none of me. Or perhaps we have both forgotten each other. Still, I am reluctant to give my name. Who knows what one may do with such a thing. Regardless, I hope that telling her will jog a memory. At least a memory, preferably two.

"Nate," I answer slowly, letting the word breathe across my lips. I'm not used to saying my own name, and in this particular instance it feels foreign and unwieldy. It seems, to me at least, that it wishes not to be heard by her ears.

"That's right! Nate! Of course I remember! I could NEVER forget you!" Her solemn expression explodes into one of intense, almost orgasmic joy. She emphasizes the word "never" with more than just a change of tone, but a flick of the eyes and a quirk of the mouth. I wonder again exactly what the nature of our relationship had been.

I remember no lovers among these folk. I fear that I may find my memory somewhat... faulty.

"All right, I'm going to get things ready for you," she says.

At the time, I was too lost in her previous words and the melting innocence of her eyes to ponder what exactly she meant by this. Now, alone in the darkness of my mind, I wonder: what precisely needed getting ready? And how did she handle it without moving so much as a whisker? Is there some vast conspiracy here? Am I being played for a fool. What awaits for me beyond the station stairs?

"Thank you for waiting. I Hope you enjoy your time in Mayhew." Waiting for no response by myself, Purrl disappears into the darkness. I hear her claws scratching on the cobbled streets for acres before they fade into silence.

Perplexed, I glance at the updated map distributed to the passengers of Porter's train. I see that this Purrl character is a resident of the D-3 district in town. Across the bridge from my neighborhood, but not too terribly far. Perhaps I will give a visit to her after I recollect myself in more familiar settings.

As I make the short trek down cobbled streets, I am humiliated by the state at which my former has found itself. Weeds line every inch of the acre which is not home to stone or tree. It is truly a disgraceful thing. Are there none with any pride in their home? Or do we all leave for long periods, allowing the poor Mayhew to become a place of desolate wreckage?

It seems my theory may not be far off: I notice that my neighbor, Maranda, has not been around recently. The flag on her mailbox flashes urgently, beckoning to be answer. Alas, there is little that can be done. Despite our time together, I have not her key. I can, however, put an end to the incessant beeping of my own paperbox.

Despite my lengthy absence, I find it is home to only pink envelopes. With a groan, I open the one addressed as being from the HRA (that's the Happy Room Academy to those not in the know. It is a sort of cult, and, between you and I, part of an investigation which is pertinent to my original departure).

They deride the size of my home, claiming that I have wasted such space by not furnishing it. I am awarded a measly 8,793 points. I scoff and toss the letter to the ground. What good are these ratings, anyhow? And just who are they, these Happy Room fellows, to enter my abode and judge it on their whims?

I put such felons out of my mind. The next letter is more interesting anyhow. It is addressed as being from a man named Cousteau. I don't recall the name, but many of those who enter these woods have outlandish monikers which, in my opinion, are far more richly and fanciful than they deserve. Wary of potential toxins, I open the envelope.


Sadness overcomes me. Sadness is probably not right word. It's more of a combination of guilt and bewilderment. I remember nothing of this Cousteau person, but they have vowed never to forget me. These words are so earnest, so sincere. I have no doubt that they are in some way true. Yet, I cannot for the life of me remember this individual. That seems to be a theme for the night; forgetfulness. Purrl's memory seemed itself flaky, and now I am to call into question my own. Is there maybe something in the air here? Something that causes those who breathe it to forget all interpersonal relationships?

I hope not.

I save the letter, and step inside. It has been two years since I've seen my home. I can hardly remember it.

It is quite different from the image in my mind. To begin with, I have three floors when all I can recall is one. The middle floor has birch-wood paneling and a simple yellow wall with a green border along the bottom. A quartet of rocky mechanisms, seemingly relatives of the dancing fire hydrant outside my home, sing a beautiful, hypnotic hymn. They are accompanied by the upbeat rhythms emanating from my personal radio. I wander over to check the track, not remembering well the name of these older albums. "K.K. Salsa". An odd accompaniment to the airy bells of the Gyroids, but I like this combination, so I leave it be.

The radiator in the back serves itself well in keeping me toasty. My furnace must be filled, I realize suddenly, despite not having tended to it in nearly two years. It is then that it strikes me, and I slide into the cream sofa with my fingers dragging at my eyes: the lights work as well. Somebody has been paying my utilities and generally, despite the cockroach infestation, caring for my facilities. Could it be that wily Thomas Nook? Yes, that seems likely. He had always taken an unusual interest in my dwellings. Of course, I suppose they are technically his dwellings. I still owe a heft debt on it all, if I recall. Still, it is odd that he would pay such expenses and keep things generally tidy. Maybe he intended to rent the place out once more, or maybe, perhaps even more likely, he scrambled to keep the HRA satisfied. It was he, after all, that signed me up for their scrutiny.

A glance at the table reveals all. Beside my globe and compass and the travel papers (was I truly so foolish?) I see a photograph I don't quite recall. It is one of Nook himself, smiling and winking as though to say: "I've got my eye on things, Nate. And certainly I've got my eye on you."

I look over my valuables briefly, noting that my former self was seemingly fond of foreign goods. I see a taxidermied grizzly bear, too small to be mature and a nauseating display piece for a town with such... particular inhabitants. Additionally my home is shared with the towering statue of a beastly mermaid and the many children of a Russian matryoshka. It's possible that these goods were placed by Nook to spruce things up, but I recall a wordy seagull who dealed in such oddities.

Wishing to familiarize myself with the rest of my home, I head downstairs.

The basement is a cluttered mess. Besides being the home of my unpocketed tools, it is also half-covered in pumpkins. Not only do jack-o-lanterns occupy the space, but a number of jack-in-the-boxes and pumpkin-themed furniture as well.  From the stairs I can spy two sofas, a dresser, and an armoire, all sporting the triangle grin. Amongst these are also a slot machine and a colorful elephant slide, a toy which reminds me of my youth. I remember now my intention that this be an arcade of sorts, a fun spot. Such explains the golden statue of one popular plumber, and feeling more at rest here than elsewhere, I take a slide and head upstairs.

My uppermost floor is dark and grim, and made entirely of stone and brick. An odd choice for a room built upon one made of light wood, but I'm no architect. It has few furnishings and the cockroaches are dismayed at my arrival, finding nowhere to hide. They dive for the stone lantern. For now I'll let them be. Additionally there are two enormous chess pieces sitting at opposite sides of the room: one a six-foot tall black queen, and the other a barely-shorter white rook. They stare at one another uneasily, and wonder just where they have lost their kings.

Mildew seems to have grown between the brick cracks. It makes me cough and agitates my asthma, so I head outside for some fresh air.

Back outside, I notice that the ground is littered with apples. I remember that such fruit are a delicacy in this village, and wonder if I had intended with them to grow an orchard. It is, however, unlikely that they are mine: the fruit occupy a certain shape surrounding Maranda's property line. Deciding to ignore the mess for now, I head to the town bulletin board to catch up on current events.

There was evidently a fair on the twenty-second. I have arrived just a few days too late. Saddened, I turn away.

My stroll through the night takes me to the most pleasant smelling of all town dumps. There I loot the rubbish and find a perfectly good leaf umbrella hiding amongst it. Additionally, I find a Maki figurine. I pocket the two, intending them for gift or barter. Doing so, I discover that my pocket is brimming with striped candies. Finding no expiration dates, I sample one of the goodies. It is delicious, and I am delighted to note that even the wrapper is edible.

I carry on with my night, considering as I go to pluck the weeds. I decide against it, for I am quite weary and in need of a good day's rest. Something chirps at me from beneath the ground, but with neither shovel nor net hunting does me no good. The town is much more populated than I remember it being, which is disappointing. I was rather fond of the sparse population.

Shortly I find that a villager has fallen asleep outside her home. Further evidence that something is wrong with the air here. Who in their right mind falls asleep on the ground? And in September? The wind is biting cold, and despite there being no rain, I fear for the girl's health. I give her a nudge, and thankfully she stirs. She looks up at me sleepily, muttering something about a "Bingo". At once her eyes pop and she lets loose with a night-shattering scream.

"Nate! What in the world are you doing here, bingo?"

This dog knows me, and I am again visited by that guilty feeling. I don't know this beast, though the map assures me her name is Bea. Flustered, she looks over my shoulder. With a blush, she admits to her embarrassment at having fallen asleep. I assure her it's alright, but don't let her in on my theory just yet. After all, she may be in on the cause.

She walks confusedly in all directions but the one to her door, despite the sleepy look in her eyes. I consider assisting her into the home, but she seems more interested in gossip.

"What do you think of Maranda, anyway, bingo? I'm kind of torn, myself," Bea begins, painfully unaware that Maranda and I quite happily involved. "That person has never sent me a single letter, even though we both live here in Mayhew."

She goes on for a while about the importance of letter-sending, despite all residents living within walking distance. I start to remember why I left this town.

After our chat, Bea nods off. Toxins or not, something is wrong with this girl. I give her a nudge, and again she wakes with a start. This time she dances urgently, as though she has to pee, begging me not to tell the others. I suggest that she head to bed, but I am blissfully ignored. Having had enough of this foolishness, I depart from the acre.

I find the familiar Nookway store just north of Bea's brand of bother. Regrettably, it is closed... but what more did I expect at such an hour? I decide to take its lead and retire for the evening. Not knowing what tomorrow will bring, I make the brief journey home and bid goodnight to my Gyroid. He seems sad to see me go, but grants me blessings nonetheless.

Now, with the Sandman lurking somewhere nearby, I chase the bugs from my cabin bed and try to rest...

Saturday, September 21, 2013

Video Game Review: Kirby's Dream Land (Kirby's Dream Collection: Special Edition) (Nintendo Wii)


Regrettably, I never really played any of the older Kirby video games. They passed under my radar as a kid (I was much more of a Mario and Sonic guy), despite his puffy, pink face being painted all over the floor of the Toys "R" Us game aisle. Oh, good times, when things weren't so homogenized... anyways, I was first brought into the Kirby fold with his appearance in the original Super Smash Bros. To be honest, I owe this franchise for introducing me to the majority of my favorite titles. If it weren't for Super Smash Bros., I'd have never touched Fire Emblem, Kirby, Metroid (beyond the original), or any Legend of Zelda games that weren't on the N64. The legion of one-shot wonders under Nintendo's belt would have completely escaped my notice, and what the hell is a Solid Snake? Aren't all snakes solid?

Well, I was a little embarrassed of Kirby at first. I mean, here I was eight or nine years old, a boy who had to do his darnest to impress the other boys (oh, and my hyper-masculine father!), and there was this fucking happy-ass Jigglypuff waving at me and singing in a baby voice. It was like the sun from Teletubbies descended into the hard-boiled world of video games. What was this nonsense?

Fortunately one of my friends rented Kirby 64, making it fair game for purchase once we all discovered what a beautiful thing it was.

Despite my love for this title, I never really felt motivated to try the rest of the games. I learned that you couldn't merge copy powers in all of them, and that was that. I wanted combined powers, damn it! At some point I got to my senses and picked up Kirby Super Star Ultra for the Nintendo DS, and it was pretty good. Not the phenomenal work of art most enthusiasts laud it to be, but pretty good. I also borrowed Kirby: Nightmare in Dream Land, which I loved left, right, up, and down (Hey, Big Guy). That really was the extent of my Kirby exposure. I mean, I watched the abominable anime Kirby: Right Back at Ya! every Saturday morning, and I knew (as I often do) the series' lore in almost all of its entirety, but it never made my "Must Have" list, and by the time I was down to second-tier wants, they were out of manufacture and boosted to re-hee-diculous prices at GameStop. Sorry, I don't pay forty bucks for a used game with no manual and a ratty insert and... pudding on the contacts?

Lately I've been interested in older games, and I'm finding that a lot of the stuff from my youth really isn't as dated as I thought it would be, and lots of games from those same eras (and even the ones prior) are actually quality titles. In particular, I've noticed a profound satisfaction from the original Game Boy era's library of titles, which is exciting to me because they're so dirt cheap and there's lots of ways to play them. Right now I've got my handy-dandy Game Boy Advance SP, but I'd eventually like to get my hands on the Game Boy Player and to reclaim the old Super Game Boy (which has different color palettes, I just learned).

Kirby's Dream Land, however, I won't be playing on any of those things, because I've got this big boy (and most of its brethren) on the Kirby Dream Collection, baby! Right away that limits how I can play it, as I'll never know if it had any colors beyond grayscale, but them's the breaks. I don't mind the grayscale at all, really, and I think it's put to good use in most titles. What I does bother me is the distracting border put around the game to make it fit the proper aspect ratio. I appreciate the aspect ratio, because things are always better when they're experienced with the proper dimensions (or multiples thereof), but the bright border is just distracting.

Fortunately, somebody at Nintendo thought the same thing, because the border can be shut off by holding two buttons (I think it's plus and minus), changing the poky pink to beautiful black. I doubt the pink border will bother most people, however. I just have excessive OCD with things in my line of sight while viewing screens. Seriously, if a human being is at all visible between the screen and myself, I will not have a good time.

The graphics are superb. Despite such a limited color palette, each object has depth and the world comes across as complete and alive. Paths are not merely obstacle course for Kirby to vault through, but real paths which are utilized by the denizens of Dream Land on a regular basis. Sure, you still get the bizarre architectural decision to build floating staircases, but that makes more sense in a world where nearly everybody can jump six feet up and fly (as opposed to the Mushroom Kingdom, where Mario actually has a superhero moniker [Jumpman] and is famous for being a better jumper than everyone else). Unlike a lot of games which feature such extensive detail, Kirby's Dream Land never gets lost in itself. The path and interactive objects are always clearly distinguished from the background, and that's key with game design.

Sounds are cheerful and fitting. They have a certain quality which is very similar to the early Pokémon titles, though I'm positive that has a lot to do with the games being designed with the same hardware limitations. Music is both simple and memorable. Modern gamers are bound to hear a couple of familiar songs, and I can promise that King Dedede's theme is just as solid here as it is in any rendition since. Naturally, the music melts into the scenery instead of opposing it, which helps the game craft a distinct atmosphere.

I didn't notice any issues with the hardware handling the game. No slowdown that comes to mind, no graphical or audio anomalies. Everything seemed to work and handle exactly as it was supposed to, which is a double-good considering this experience is technically an emulated one. Even the best emulators seem to muck something up a bit, but I guess having developed the original system, it's a bit easier for Nintendo to make it work flawlessly. There is one drawback to the handling, though, and it's unfortunately by design. Kirby's classic flutter ability debuted with the puffball in this game, and it's actually more or less the focus of the game's design. Unlike future games, Kirby can fly forever here, with the game being adequately designed to challenge this style of play (although it did make some portions much easier than they should have been). Thing is, Kirby doesn't float by tapping the "A" button while already in the air. Not initially, anyway. Instead you have to tap "Up" on the D-Pad to enter puff-mode. From there you can tap "A" or "Up" to float as needed, but that really makes it more of a hassle than it ought to be, and there were a few challenges where this limitation caused me to slip up and take a hit or miss a platform.

Enemies are varied, with some making me question why they exist as there are other foes which serve the same purpose. I guess it's okay in situations where certain enemy characters exist only in specific environments, because that goes a long way towards world-building. There are a handful of attack types which can prove to be either harmless or extremely annoying, but on the whole everything is fair. I never once felt like an obstacle or enemy was too difficult or unfairly designed, which can be a real problem for some games. Honestly, I feel there is a good pace in terms of difficulty where the enemies and challenges are concerned.

There are four world bosses and several mini-bosses, all of which are brilliantly designed, deceptively challenging, and brimming with character. Modern gamers will find a few familiar faces in the forms of Whispy Woods, Kracko and King Dedede while veterans and historians will be interested in the surprise cameo of Lolo and Lala at the end of world two (and the unanswered implications of their opposing Kirby). World three ends with not so much a distinct character, but an enhanced version of a common obstacle: a Blatzy tied to a large, blimp-like balloon which battles Kirby in an aerial dogfight reminiscent of the scrolling shooter genre, which was popular at the time. The best part is that, unlike most games which incorporate this style of fight contrary to the rest of the game (such as Super Mario Land), the mechanics for this confrontation are the familiar floating mechanics, forcing players to master all modes of locomotion.

Kirby's Dream Land has swiftly become my favorite game in the series (although we'll see how I feel about it after a reintroduction to Crystal Shards), and it certainly deserves a chance by any folks who fancy themselves gamers. Poor decision in controls and an inability to play the game at the size of the original Game Boy screen (which results in objects appearing a little pixelated) are the only things holding it back from a perfect score. That doesn't mean it won't get an "A", though. Mr. Sakurai's younger self was right on the money with this mean eating machine, and I'm letting him walk away holding a nine out of ten with no regrets.


So a Man Walks into the 21st Century...

A disheveled-looking man approached an officer one afternoon. His hair was dry and dusty and knotted in clumps, his clothes were ragged, dangling, and torn. And ever so bizarre, too. Like aluminum foil! Dark bags hung under his spacey brown eyes. Cuts and bruises decorated his cheeks like tribal paint. He walked with a limp, courtesy of the busted ankle on his left side.

"Officer," the man wheezed, reaching out weakly and clutching the enforcement's collar for support. "Officer, do you have the year?"

"The year?" the officer asked, cocking an eye at both the man and his question. His fingers danced along his belt, waiting for the order.

"Yes, yes. Do you know what year it is?" Stink from the man's breath wafted up the officer's nose.

The cop gagged on the stench, in his disgusts finding that he, too, had forgotten the year. He checked his watch (the same one he'd worn since third-grade. With the press of a button, he could send a two-bit surfer half a mile over blue LED).

"It's 2013, sir."

"Oh, right, yes, 2013, of course it is." The man pulled himself straight, releasing the death grip on the officer's collar. His clothes crinkled with each minor movement. "That should be good. Perfect actually. We-we still have freedom of speech around here, right?"

"Uh, yeah," the officer replied. He scratched his head. "Listen, what's this all ab—"

"I can say anything? Absolutely anything I want? Anything, anywhere, anytime. That's the law?"

"Yeah, guy. It's in the Constitution. You have the right to free speech, you can say anything. Give it a try sometime. Knock yourself out. But right now, bud, I'm a little concerned about you. You been hitting the bars already? Need to go sleep it off?"

"No, no bars. No time for that now." The man spun around, bounding away from the officer and in the general direction of an out-door cafe shouting: "Listen! Listen! Hey, listen!"

The tea-sippers all turned, most all with one eye twitching in utter incomprehension at this most uncouth of disruptions.

"Listen, you have to listen." The man waved his arms about frantically. "I'm from the near future. 2023, to be exact. Just ten years from now. Listen, please, there's no time. You must act now! You must not elect—"

"Wait! You there! Halt!" The officer came racing after, baton at the ready. In twice the time he was with them, nabbing the outlandish man by the arm.

"Wh-what's the problem, officer? I thought—"

"Yo-you can't say things here. Not in public. Somebody might hear you!"

The strange man hasn't been heard from since.

Thursday, September 12, 2013

Comic Review: Batman Beyond: Hear No Evil (2002)

Batman Beyond: Hear No Evil masquerades as a standard children's picture book tying into the ever-popular market of Saturday morning cartoons. The flavor of May, 2002 happened to be the outstanding Batman Beyond animated program, which served as a sequel to the award-winning Batman: The Animated Series and would influence not only the DC Animated Universe, but DC's entire franchise as we know it (even seeing a revival as a monthly title in 2011 which ties directly into the main DC universe). As I mentioned, however, this book, much like Batman himself, is merely undercover. Under its cover you won't find the standard morally-infused childhood fare, but a solid 24-page comic story.

The comic is definitely written for a younger audience, but unlike a lot of such material, it doesn't ever treat them like idiots. Most children's media is far up its adult ass that it can't help talking down to the kids, and that's something that put even me off in my younger years (and I like everything!). This book, on the other hand, just wants to tell a good story. And it does. Well.

Each page is split into a few large panels with surprisingly good art which matches up pretty well with the cartoon it's cashing in on. The dialogue is simple and toned down to appease the censors, but none of it feels contrived and it all flows very naturally. The characters all sound like they're supposed to, and you can tell that the writer, Scott Peterson, really got into their heads and went the extra mile to not just tell a story which is "good enough" for children, but to tell a Batman Beyond story.

While there isn't a moral in plain sight, the book does adequately deliver a message of kindness. There's all of one obvious plot hole which can be ironed out with just the tiniest bit of imagination, and contrary to form, significant character development! I mean, there's no surprises for an adult, we'll all know how it's going to end practically before it's even begun. However, that doesn't detract from the effectiveness of the story and the superb pacing. Honestly, if this were published as a one-shot story in the monthly title, I wouldn't be disappointed one bit.

Let me just answer your questions real quick: story, good. Art, good. Characters, good. Book, good. As far as comics go, it's not the grand epic of a more mature tale, but who could expect it to be? Now, as far as children's comics go? Oh yeah. This is good. This is nine out of ten good. The back cover lets me know that it sold for $3.25 US, which is actually less than modern comics. Weird, considering this will last longer when exposed to its target audience.

You know what the best part is? Any age will enjoy it. I enjoyed it enough to read it again, and I'm sure I'll do so a third time in the future. If you're going to slap four bucks on a comic anyway, might as well make it a good one.

Literature Review: Super Mario: How Nintendo Conquered America by Jeff Ryan (2011)

Being an avid fan of Super Mario, Nintendo itself, and "making of" type notes and documentaries, Jeff Ryan's book Super Mario: How Nintendo Conquered America was a shoo-in (which, shouldn't that be "shoe-in"? As in, a shoe in the door?) for my small personal library. Immediately upon holding it for the first time, I was filled with the nostalgia and youthful bliss. Memories of Super Mario Bros. 2, Donkey Kong Classics, and of course, the original Super Mario Bros. (the version attached at the hip with Duck Hunt, of course). That unmistakable blue hue of a NES palette sky and the classic Little Mario leaping sprite (which has been raised into 16-bit here, sporting a more modern look for the spaghetti squire) were just as welcoming and enticing as any old-school start screen. All it was missing was a demo reel when you let it sit too long.

Regrettably, it seems video game lit. has only barely evolved beyond the 2600 era. While the book is interesting and features a fairly detailed history of the Nintendo company and its execs., I can't feel confident that any of the new information I acquired is accurate. I'd love for it to be, because there's really some quite interesting stuff that made me pop an eyebrow or two, but the book is riddled with so many simple mistakes that I wonder if Mr. Ryan did much homework at all. Now, I'm not just talking about typos (although such things are both rampant and inconsistent, such as occasionally spelling "Goomba" as "Goombah", messing Konami into "Komani", and not once failing to misspell Kotaku as "Kokatu"), but jarring factual errors that the most basic of gamers would never get wrong. Things like confusing the Panasonic and Philips companies made reading confusing and difficult to keep track of, but are a little more forgivable since they're kind of out of the way of the main topic. However, being totally off the mark about the American version of Super Mario Bros. 2, being so wrong as to confuse the great Wart for Bowser and Subcon for the Mushroom Kingdom, are inexcusable errors. For a book named after, and focusing on, Super Mario, it really screwed up the pasta-pummeler's history.

Now, I did look up a few things that sounded odd to me which turned out to be true (one of which was about a little game called Waku Waku Sonic Patrol Car, which I took as being a misconstrued version of the Japanese exclusive Sonic Drift. Turns out I was wrong), so at least some of Ryan's information is correct. It's just unfortunate that figuring out just how much will require doing enough research to write up your own back, which is sad for a book which is supposed to educational itself.

Honestly, I wouldn't be able to recommend this book for educating yourself or others in video game history. It's too... wrong in too many places. While the title might be easier to bite into than some of the heavier, more dull reports on the topic, it kind of presents the anti-intellectual fallacy bandied about in the American educational system: teach them the easiest understanding possible, then unteach it to them later. You have no idea how challenging it can be to unlearn something, and I know that was one of the wort parts of school for me. "Hey, remember how we told you the Pilgrims were the first people to reach America? We lied to ya, buddy!"

I didn't learn that the word "pilgrim" wasn't exclusive to the group of Mayflower settlers until ninth grade. That's a dangerous thing to do. People tend to hold onto the first bits of knowledge they get, and if it's wrong, that person is going to have a hard time readjusting the fundamental layer of their thinking. Hell, Brontosaurus is still how it's spelled in my book!

But enough beating, because Ryan really isn't a bad or even mediocre writer. His editing team needed to be a little better, and he's gotta work on that research if he wants to write non-fiction, but he seems to have a gift with making it interesting. See, that's half the battle, especially with text like this. You might come out with a book that's really informative and gets it all right, but if your prose is drab I'm going to drop you like a day-old sock. Jeff Ryan has a voice derived from years as a journalist. Sometimes this makes Super Mario read a little too much like an issue of Nintendo Power magazine, but then again, I subscribed to Nintendo Power magazine (a moment of silence, please).

There are bits of sarcasm and bite to his voice which are all-too common among the smug pop-culture journalist crowd, and there were times when it got to be a little much. Skip the parentheticals, and you'll manage to dodge most of that (I seem to have picked a little something up from this book after all. Sorry, Jeff). However, his natural voice and inability not to characterize something lends itself wonderfully to drawing the audience into history as it unfolds before them. Anybody who picks this one up will already know about Shigeru Miyamoto and Satoru Iwata, and they sure as hell better known Gunpei Yokoi, but Ryan's text does more than just let you know what these men did and why you should know them; it turns them into characters, and welcomes you along on their journey as they develop from unknown young men into celebrated pioneers of the digital era.

The book is divided into parts which seem to follow along with the evolution of Nintendo's consoles, despite some overlap. The first part is the arcade era, you get the NES era, SNES, N64, GCN, and finally Wii. Each part is divided into several chapters, all of which are puns on various Mario games, and used in ways which reflect the general tone of the chapter. It's something aficionados will get a chuckle out of, and it's the kind of fun I imagine Nintendo would themselves have with a self-styled history book.

For the most part, Super Mario is an interesting read. The last chapter, however, is kind of a Shyamalan-style tone-twist. We go from praising Mario and the Nintendo company to a diatribe about how Chinese workers slave away in sweatshops (and often commit suicide) to make it all possible. It kind of makes one double-take and wonder if this was all a set-up by some human rights group. The narrative then turns again, now full of provolone optimism about how Mario will once again lead us all into an era of digital enlightenment. Really, it's the kind of poor ending you expect out of fiction (which almost never ends well), but not an over-stuffed IGN article.

In short: this book cannot be read for factual use as there are too many errors. However, as a work of near-fiction and a character story, it is more than adequate and highly entertaining. Unfortunately, that isn't the purpose of a non-fiction piece. For featuring heavy bias (it's evident Mr. Ryan is no fan of Pokémon), distracting diatribes and self-important quips, and, above all, dangerous misleading falsities marched through the streets as facts, I have no choice but to score Super Mario: How Nintendo Conquered America a mere three out of five stars. I'll see you after class, Mr. Ryan. Maybe next time you'll do your homework.