Wednesday, October 27, 2010

Charlie Chaplin and the Time Travel Paradox

I got an unusual call after I got home from Church this eve. Apparently, they caught a Time Traveler on tape! Wow, I thought. Of course, i googled it and found a link to the Youtube video.

Interesting indeed. Well, it's unusual. There is no evidence to suggest that the .. woman? .. is talking on a cell phone. It could well be anything or nothing for that matter. My current theory is that she's either: A)Covering her ear due to the wind in the background B) Simply hiding her face from the jackass cameraman. What if it is a time traveler, though? Let's go there. There are a couple of possible implications.

Backward time travel is currently thought of as impossible, though whose to say? Flight was once thought of as impossible. Anyway, this would-be technology obviously comes sometime after the year 2010. And now that a million people have seen this "time traveler" before said time travel technology was invented, it may well alter history. Now, things may play out in such a manner that the traveler never opts to come back in time. What happens then? How do we still see the video? This, my friends, is what they call a paradox.

An interesting paradox fixing solution is out there, though. I know it from Zelda, but it seems like I heard it in some sciencey garble too. The solution is this: To avoid the implosion of reality or whatever, a second universe is created.

20XX, the woman goes back in time on vacation to the set of a Charlie Chaplin movie. Much to her dismay, she's caught on film. Hastily perhaps, she heads on home and tries to avoid causing any more damage to the spacetime continuum. Now she's in the future. However, in her past, things are going batshit crazy. A divergent timeline is created, our timeline.

In this timeline of the universe, the woman will likely never visit the past, or if she does it will be done differently, changing anything from her outfit to where she visits. But this is alright since she did it in our past, coming from her timeline. We will still see it, avoiding any paradoxes.

Here's a lovely graphic I spent thirty seconds on.
Photobucket

Monday, October 25, 2010

Oh, the humanity...

I almost ready buy into Calvinism's doctrine of total depravity. Here's why:

They're the Enemy: Get 'em! Politics is depressing. It shows us the real level of malice that most human beings hide behind a pretty exterior. Politicians revel in that malice, and people revel in feeding them. Everyone needs an enemy, and politicians are ever so eager to give them one.

Example: I once "liked" our good President on Facebook, only to be promptly greeted with a message about the things the other guys are doing wrong. I'm sure I would've gotten the same thing if I'd opted to like Republicans or the Tea Party.

Play the Victim! Play the Victim! It seems to me that a lot of people are pretty eager to be wronged in some manner. Of course, when you are wronged, you get an automatic enemy to rally the troops against. I see this in friendships, relationships, politics (especially politics), and religion. Sheesh.

Now, finally, let me say I'm not above this hostile and dark part of human nature. I'm as selfish, arrogant, and hostile as anyone. But that doesn't mean I have to like it. ;)

Friday, October 22, 2010

My Favorite Zelda Tunes

Those who have befriended me on facebook know this: I love instrumental pieces from video games. Why? Well, I guess it has to do with music's ability to bring a given story to life. Classical instrumental music is like video game music without a story. Within video games, that same genre of music has a chance to add more even details to a story.

Furthermore, I like orchestrations of many of these works. Sometimes, the inferior synthetic quality of game consoles just doesn't let the real sound shine through. May there never come a time when music with words takes precedence over instrumental music. Below are some of my favorite pieces of music. You'll notice that I have a strong preference for the march ballads. (note: all of these come in the form of youtube videos.)

Songs from Zelda that I like:

Midna's Lament: This is an unusual piece from the land of Hyrule. Most Zelda music is upbeat. This one is more of a somber reflection on the nature of mortality.

Dark Mountain: Gods yes! In my opinion, it's about the never ending struggle between Link and Ganon. FORWARD MARCH!

Great Palace: I couldn't find a good orchestration of this one, but this links to the original. As Link storms through the Great Palace, fierce Bird Knights continually assault him. Then, he comes to the Thunderbird, who is five times his size. And the last enemy.. himself. Unlike the other dark an almost metal melodies in AoL, this one is very reassuring. It's like the game is cheering you on with such an upbeat melody.

Hyrule Castle: Another march style ballad. This one really helped give A Link ot the Past that feeling of grandeur so many of us Zelda fans appreciate. Also, it has an amazing breakdown.

A Link to the Past Ending:When I heard this, it was the first time I'd felt happy that a video game had ended. What a delightful piece, it continues reveling in the mysticism that the storyline did, right up until the very end. Its synchronization to the on screen actions make it even better. When Link walks away from the pedastal, presumably returning to society to just be a normal guy, the player is left with the feeling that something astonishing just happened. Or at least, I was. My favorite of all game themes here, and perhaps my favorite piece of music as well.

Thursday, October 21, 2010

Pantheism vs. Monotheism vs. Atheism

Pantheism: The concept is simple enough: God is in us all. You could expound upon it and suggest that, due to his being in all things, God is omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, eternal, and really whatever you like.

Monotheism: The concept varies from deity to deity, but we're using the Christian God for our purposes here. God is still in all things due to his omnipresence. All things are in God due to God's omnipresence. Think about it: If God is in all of the oxygen around me, then I am very much inside of God. In fact, I would submit that Monotheism is basically Pantheism with a "declared sentience".

Atheism: Ah, yes. The lack of belief in any gods. Strictly speaking, atheism is totally different from both pantheism and monotheism as it has no gods: period. However, all thinking atheists believe in something, even if it's just the energy the universe is comprised of. And in that energy, the same energy many pantheists venerate, there is common ground with both pantheism and monotheism.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

Boss Battle Analysis: Majora's Mask

In my most popular post to date, I presented a sort of panentheistic, perhaps even monistic, way to explain the potential nature of a monotheistic God. The concept is simple enough: God is energy. In order to fulfill his primary role, energy condenses itself so that it might become "more than energy", allowing for creation.

I noticed something while playing LoZ: Majora's Mask the other day. The final boss, Majora, seems to be example number one of energy condensing itself into matter.

Majora's Mask: Majora's Mask starts out exactly as you'd expect it to: as a mask. So Link begins fighting the sentient mask, hammering away at it with the Fierce Deity Mask. Realizing the battle is going Link's way, Majora extends his consciousness to the masks of the the four giants(1:25). I like to think of Majora as being pure energy, and that his physical form (the mask) is using work to push that energy into the masks. Whenever Link strikes a blow, matter is destroyed, releasing the innate energy back into the universe.

Majora's Incarnation: Fierce Deity Link successfully kills off the new masks of Majora, and returns his focus to killing the mask. Again, realizing the battle is lost, Majora changes his nature. This time, he does something a little more impressive: He creates matter out of thin air (2:05). To do this, he has to spend some of the energy that he is. From the name "Majora's Incarnation", we can probably also infer that this is the form that the energy can identify most closely with.

Majora's Wrath: Majora senses his end. His true form failed to defeat Fierce Deity Link, and he has one last trick up his sleeve. He re-envisions that true form, spending the last of his available energy. What we get is Majora's wrath. (2:45) He's like Majora's Incarnation, except a tad darker, and clearly a little more brutal. Instead of running around cockily, reveling in his own superiority, Majora knows the situation is now 'kill or be killed'. However, again Link defeats him, which is bad news for Majora: He's expunged all of his available energy, causing the entire area to fade into oblivion along with the energy that caused its creation.

Sunday, October 17, 2010

Religiosity and Intelligence: A Hypothesis

Anti-religious individuals enjoy pointing to the apparent negative correlation between Religiosity and Intelligence. For theists and other proponents of religion, the above article certainly presents itself as "an inconvenient fact". I've even seen some of the more irreligious atheists take it as a sign of their innate mental superiority.

The hypothesis of these individuals seems to be, "If an individual is highly intelligent, then that individual will almost certainly reject religion." It's overly simplistic to be sure, and there are countless counterexamples in history books and today's headlines, but that does seem to be the claim being made. With that in mind, I offer a counter-hypothesis.

Hypothesis: The nature of religion causes religious individuals to have more to think about than atheists. Being an atheist requires one to know nothing, as it is by definition a state of "not knowing" something. Consequently, religious individuals of equal intelligence [to a given atheist] have a certain part of their mental ability partitioned off for religiosity, thus causing slightly lower scores on IQ tests.

The fact that complicated things are more difficult to understand than easy things should be an axiom accepted by all. For instance, a given individual can learn the relatively simple syntax of a programming language in far less time than it takes to become fluent in a large linguistic language (example: I picked up php's syntax in one day. :D). Most programming languages are written with the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis in mind, and the fact that people easily learn these languages seems to offer more proof of the above axiom.

So too it is with atheism and religion. "Some thing" [religion] always requires more thinking power than "no thing" [atheism].

Friday, October 15, 2010

The Argument From Energy

1. Void does not exist in the natural universe. In every conceivable location, there is something, be it energy or matter.

2. Matter is energy in a different form.

3. Since energy exists within matter, and energy exists within itself, energy is in every conceivable location. Thus, energy is omnipresent.

4. All things that are accomplished are accomplished with energy. Anything that can be done must be done with energy. In fact, all things that have or ever will be done must be done with energy. Since energy accomplishes all things, it is very much omnipotent.

5. Since energy can neither be created nor be destroyed, energy is eternal.

6. Everything that can or will be known is known through energy in the form of matter. Therefore, energy knows all things that are or ever have been known, a quality one could refer to as Omniscience.

7. The earth was created through the condensing of energy into matter. Therefore, energy created the heavens and the earth.

8. Since energy is invisible by nature, is in the sky, and resulted in the earth's creation, one could necessarily refer to it as an Invisible Skydaddy.

Let's see.. an Eternal, Omniscient, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Earth Creating, Invisible Skydaddy? Sounds an awful lot like god. Also, if matter is like energy's good creation, does that make anti-matter the devil?

Thursday, October 14, 2010

If Atari Made a Zelda Game...

I was thinking about the influence hit 1980s adventure game Adventure has had on Zelda. It was truly the first non-text based 'dungeon conquering' game. Then, I thought to myself, what would it look like if Atari made a zelda game? Basically, the following is a sort of 'fanfic' in which the events of Adventure are part of the Zelda backstory, and Link finds and uses various items from that game. Also, he visits the mystical two colored kingdom in which Adventure took place. Btw, this is envisioned as a 3D game. lol

The Legend of Zelda: Quest for the Chalice

Prologue

Ganon reemerges once again, resurrecting his hoards of evil monsters. A might force is being accumulated in the desert to the west, and likely preparing for an all out invasion of Hyrule. It seems one of Ganon's minions managed to find the Golden Chalice, an artifact long thought to exist only in legend. Using the Golden Chalice, he drank the waters of life, and thus gained immortality. Then he began to use the cup's power to revive his minions. All of those who ever served the Dark Lord came that day.

The numbers of these monsters were too great for a Hylian Brigade led by the Hero himself to challenge. Because of this, the Old Man began to search through the Castle's library of ancient books and scrolls. It was then he heard of the Golden Chalice, and also of the lost kingdom it had originated from. Surely, Ganon was using this power of life to call forth this Dark Resurrection.

The kingdom was, according the legend, created by the lost Hylian civilization as an ultimate display of their power. It existed not in three dimensions as all other kingdoms do, but rather in two. Using their advanced technology, they created four square shaped dimensional modulators which altered the very nature of the space in which the kingdom would reside. From there, great artists used rendering magicks to render a kingdom inside of that space.

The rendered two dimensional area took up only 12 meters on any side. However, the rendered kingdom could house and support as many as three hundred thousand Hylians. Because of the efficiency associated with two dimensional rendering, more and more Hylians began to reside in that space. However, this would be the undoing of the Hylian race. A King of a nearby land became jealous of all the Hylian tecnological wiles, and decided to invade Hyrule and take the kingdom for himself.

Only two thousand men manned Hyrule that day. Some escaped from the painting, but the skilled warriors from the neighboring land took the building before many could get out. When the squares were removed, the kingdom became only a painting, presumably killing all inside.

The King took the squares back to his kingdom, but none of his wise men could understand this technology. Later on, the kingdom faded away, and officially was claimed as Hylian land several generations ago. The fate of the squares and the painting is unknown [the painting is Link's House where the Mario picture is in Alttp].

Link must find the Four Squares, recover the Chalice, and defeat Ganon's minions.

Dungeon 1: Death Mountain: Waterfall Entrance.
After Old Man tells Link about that crazy story, he suggests he go speak with the Great Fairy since she's immortal. Link walks into the water fall, and it's revealed that a dungeon with one of the squares is inside of this cave.. It's dark. There are keese. Little black shadow monsters lurk just beyond the light. Link gets the stepladder here. Isn't that awesome? The boss is the giant bat from A Link to the Past.

Dungeon 2: Temple of Light

Link uses the stepladder to cross some sort of high ledge. It carries him onto a previously inaccessible mountain. There he wanders around cluelessly until falling into a portal that leads into the sacred realm.

Some unusual technology is floating around here. The area seems to have been overrun by monsters. Moblins are stationed throughout the place. Like likes seem to have magnets in their bellies as Link will lose his shield if he gets too close.

Link finds a magnet in this dungeon. It gives him the power to draw metallic objects toward him. It's useful for knocking over unaware those eagle creatures.

At the end of the dungeon, Link finds and rescues Rauru from some Moblins. Rauru informs him that Ganon infiltrated the Sacred Realm using the power of the Chalice, and stormed the Temple of Light in an effort to find the Triforce. Fortunately though, the Triforce was with Link. With all safe, Link leaves the realm and continues onto the third dungeon.

Dungeon 3: Great Palace

Link heads on back to talk to Zelda about the developments in the Sacred Realm. She then tells Link that he has to stop his quest and hide Triforce. A tad annoyed, Link agrees to take the Triforce to the Great Palace, at which point Old Man will put some sort of protective shield around the place.

However, the creatures inside have been ordered to kill anything that enters by the Guardian gods of Hyrule. Apparently they have to protect the “other treasure” of Hyrule. So Link finds himself killing our sorts of “good badguys” to get to the room the Old Man wants the Triforce in. They respawn with impunity, suggesting immortality.

While journeying there, he finds a Spear. Suddenly, Old Man contacts him telepathically: “Link. This is the spear that the Legendary Hero once used to gain the Chalice. I believe that your stumbling across it is more than mere chance. Surely, surely, the Goddesses have predestined this finding. As the Hero did then, so must you too. As it has been said, 'When one door closes, another is sure to open.' ”

Link can now use the magnet and the spear in tandom to eliminate the jumping birdlike creatures. With great skill, he approaches the desired room. Old Man contacts him, telling him to climb the ladder and wish for the Triforce to leave him, and that one piece at a time would slowly come to rest in this secret and safe location. After he places the Triforce of Courage, he hears a footstep. Link turns around, and sees nothing. He then resumes the process. Another footstep. He turns his head around. SMACK!

Link is knocked off the platform. It seems he was attacked by some sort of square. That's right.. a square. The square has a magnet and spear just like him! The square screams: “Intruder! Leave this place lest death fall upon you!”

Link explains that he's leaving the Triforce behind, but the square doesn't believe him, saying “You are a pillager. The evidence in the spear you hold. My spear!” A cameo ensues with the square running around quickly, sort of like the Wizzrobes in Majora's Mask.

The square is faster than Link, but fortunately he is a square, so Link wins the battle. The square concedes defeat saying, “Only the Hero could defeat me. I now return to my rest. Godspeed Link.” The square leaves behind one of the Four Squares.

Link starts to place the remaining pieces of the Triforce, but cannot seem to place. Zelda contacts him telepathically, “Link. Come quick! A fleet of Wizzrobes stormed the castle, kidnapping my father! Old Man is dead!” Realizing that the placement of the Triforce is now impossible, Link heads toward Hyrule Castle.

Dungeon 4: The Desert Temple.

The Knights of Hyrule feel humiliated because of their defeat. They had kept the small fleet of Wizzrobes from taking the castle, but one eluded them transporting directly to the King's chamber. Link speaks with them, and they decide to go and battle Ganon's armada of enemies.

A week later, after all preparations have been made, they depart for the Gerudo desert. A great battle ensues, with the outcome uncertain. While Link is slashing away at Moblins, the other three Squares resonate with a white light, indicating that the other crystal is near. After the Hylians win and rescue the King, Link heads for the Desert Temple.

With a sense of deja vu, Link battles the same foes he did in A Link to the Past. When he enters the area once occupied by three Moldorms, he marvels.. It's friggin' empty. Or so he thinks. He hears a sound. The “Fire Breathing Two Dimensional Beast: DuKragon” appears. The creature looks kind of unsual in three dimensions, and Link only gets a good look at it when it runs to the left. If it gets too close to Link, it will swallow him and then spit him out. It shoots fire: three dimensional fire. Link kills it in one blow with the spear, retrieving the fourth square from its stomach.

Dungeon #5: Into the 2nd Dimension

Link just wonders what Ganon's up to. He was not found among the dead from the Battle of Gerudo Desert, nor was he taken prisoner. The Hylian Knights interrogate a surving Wizzrobe. With some coercion, the Wizzrobe reveals that Ganon has been controlling his army from the lost two dimensional kingdom of the Hylians. However, the Wizzrobe didn't know where that kingdom was. Cockily, he told the knights that Ganon now had the keys to death, and that not even Link could stop Ganon now.

Link knows the kingdom is in a painting, but where the painting is is beyond him. So he begins to search, one painting at a time. There are a lot of them in this game, but the right one is in his uncle's house. He finds it, causing the Squares to resonate, and then takes it back to Hyrule castle. With some diligence, the Court Magician figures out how to get the thing to work, placing the squares equidistantly on platforms. Then the painting comes to life and the figures begin to rapidly move like a dvd on fast forward. After a few minutes of 'fast forwarding', the picture resumes a pleasant normal flow. Link steps forward to get a closer look, only to be sucked in.

He's in a new town of some kind. It's pretty weird. There aren't many people around. Link approaches some of the townspeople and asks about Ganon. No one has heard that name, but every keeps murmuring about the 'tribe to the north'. Confused, Link heads toward the ominous black castle to the north.

And sure enough, this is Ganon's tower. Link scales the castle walls using the stepladder, getting inside the ramparts. He heads either right or left. Either way, he uses the magnet to draw the blocks into place, causing a doorway to open to the inside of the castle.

On the inside he fights a bunch of bad guys. Finally, he fights Ganon and gets the chalice. However, he's gotta get out now, and all of Ganon's minions are chasing him. With some trouble, he runs back toward the town, being chased by the minions. Fortunately, the Hylians come to his aid, killing off the baddies with lasers. Lasers man! Friggin' lasers!

The Hylians thank Link, giving him his last heart piece. Plot developments end with Link talking to Zelda. The game never truly ends, thus allowing the player to explore Hyrule and the new area.

Monday, October 11, 2010

Where did we go wrong with robots?

Androids like Data from Star Trek were never part of 'the dream' as I understood it. Our ideal goal for artificial intelligence is a tin man who speaks in an crackly electronic voice. All this fancy technology that we have available now will undoubtedly screw up our dream. If we could develop the 'bot', it would synthesize speech almost perfectly, and that's awful.

Saturday, October 9, 2010

What Zelda Teaches Kids...

We've talked about the interesting lessons from inside the game, but what have we learned from actually playing the game? Something like this:

Zelda Teaches Kids How to Innovate: In Mario, what you do is quite intuitive. In modern FSPs, reflexes are the bodily function necessary. In RPGs, you can basically win by spamming the action button all the way through. However, in Zelda (and games like it), you have to think. For instance: In Misery Mire, there is a complex puzzle (especially for a young kid! lol) where you have to set off a switch, set down a bomb next to the switch, cross the new area, and wait for the bomb to go off. I remember thinking as a kid, "If I can solve that puzzle, I can solve -any- problem. I beat Misery Mire dude!"


Zelda Teaches Kids About Persistence: When I was playing A Link to the Past, I died in Misery Mire more times than I can count. Too many. I got all of my friends to try it, but no one could finish it. The ice was too slick and the monsters too tough. Then one day, after countless attempts, I finished it.

Zelda Teaches Kids How to Share: I still recall hearing that crap in kindergarten about 'sharing'. I didn't buy it for a second, and I wasn't the only one. A silly puppet show about not being greedy can't get into the minds of today's kids. However, realizing that Zelda is just one player and that you actually need the help of your friends is great advertising for sharing.

Zelda Show Kids Collaborative Problem Solving: In the context of taking turns playing Zelda with friends, kids realize that many of the puzzles are extremely complex, requiring the study of countless maps and putting the layouts of multiple floors together. It's not enough to just take turns 'trying to take a crack at it'; you actually need to discuss the problem. This is a valuable skill which most adults still don't have.

Friday, October 8, 2010

Nothingness: God?

Existing is a complex topic, and that is somewhat of an understatement. However, if one had to briefly explain existence to one who did not intuitively understand, they might decide to do it like thus: “Existing, or being, is perhaps explained via contrast to its logical opposite: Nonexistence, or not being. Existent things have a material mark that can be observed in the universe, whereas nonexistent things lack this feature.”

The nature of this post has little to do with the material universe, and yet also, it has everything to do with it. Let us take a close look at the attributes of nonexistence, which we'll henceforth refer to as nothingness in order to better relate the ideas in question.

Nothingness is eternal. It does not have a beginning, and it does not have an end. Before there was anything, there was nothingness. Where there is void, there is also nothingness. If the universe ceases to exist in the future, there will still be that lack of anything. Therefore, nothingness is immortal.

Nothingness is everywhere. The universe is mostly empty, and there is even empty space (at the atomic level) inside of material things such as Zelda carts or humans. Whereever there is not 'some thing', there is nothing. The nature of nothingness exists within all things and all nothingness, a quality also referred to as omnipresence.

If nothingness is within all things, then that nothingness is necessarily a part of those things. However, the human being itself is not nothingness as there are material aspsects to its full being.

Since nothingness is deeply rooted within the material of every existent thing within the universe, it is as much responsible for the actions of a given material object as the object itself is. That is to say, the object may well cease to exist if the nothingness went away. Furthermore, since the possibilities of the conceivable actions for a given entity are endless, nothingness is, for all intents and purposes, omnipotent.

If nothingness is inside of all things, to the point that it has a definite role over that which actions occur, then the universe's collective amount of nothingness is privy to an insurmountable amount of knowledge. Whether nothingness can view or understand the database is a definite unknown, but this quality is necessarily omniscience.

I hope, for your sake, you see where this is going. There are a lot of applications of this, but I'll take the most interesting one: The Big Bang, the singularity, and the inevitable nothingness before.

Before we delve straight into that, let's make a pit stop over at theism central station. A common skeptic's objection to God is thus: “Who created God?” A fun new answer to this question might be: “God is nothingness. Nothingness really doesn't require creation as it is the lack of creation.”

Now, onto the fun creation of the universe: The universe was created by nothing, which under my own semi-postulated logic is God. Everyone wins. Eat your heart out Thomas Aquinas.

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Majora's Mask: The Solution?

I think most of the Zelda fans from Alttp and before realize the difficulty of these games has dramatically decreased. Twilight Princess, Ocarina of Time, and the Wind Waker, all pale in comparison to the challenges present in LoZ, AoL, and Alttp.

As the title suggests, I think that Majora's Mask offers a solution to this little problem. The dungeons are pretty easy, but the time limits of this game make several of the sidequests near impossible.

I've played this title off an on for a few years now, but it wasn't until yesterday that I decided to attempt to get the fairies in the Stone Tower Temple. Thankfully, I opted to play the Inverted Song of Time at 6:30 AM (game time), because I needed almost all of that time to find those fairies. It was about 11 o'clock on the third day before I found them all. That's pretty impressive, as I've strolled through that dungeon numerous times.

If Nintendo refuses to make the enemies cause more damage (which they should), perhaps they might bring back Majora's Mask's time limit concept. Here's hoping.

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

Thoughts on Zelda: Skyward Sword

The Legend of Zelda: Skyword Sword is supposed to bring Zelda to life, allowing you to control you Wii Remote as if it were an actual sword. Many people are pretty excited about this. And I suppose the novelty will be interesting.

The few graphics we've seen look pretty good. I'm not terribly pleased with the style, but I'm sure it will be aesthetically pleasing overall. They seemed to opt to maintain Zelda's fantasy style graphics for the areas (those forests and fields just don't quite look real :D), which is a good thing.

In spite of all these lovely things, I still have my doubts about the direction this is heading. Answer this: What do LoZ, AoL, Alttp, Link's Awakening, Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, Oracle of Ages/Seasons, The Wind Waker, and Twilight Princess (gamecube version) have in common? They all have a traditional controller interface.

I wasn't terribly pleased with this point and click poo for TP's Wii Version. It took away an excellent analog interface and replaced it with a not so great one. I dislike it so much that I've actually thought about getting the gamecube version off ebay.

Having said all of that, I guess I should realize that Skyward Sword will likely improve off of the shaky foundation Twilight Princess laid. Even so, I maintain my cry: "NINTENDO! MAKE. A. FRIGGIN'. NORMAL. CONTROLLER!!!!!!!!!!!"

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Nintendo Wins the Console War?

I think so. It's unfortunate, what with the terrible controls, but it appears to be the case. First, lets look at the numbers by unit:

Wii Sales: 70.93 Million.
PS3 Sales: 38.1 Million.
Xbox 360 Sales: 41.7 Million.

Why is that? Everyone sort of dislikes the Wii. Simple answer: Cost. The Wii isn't as affable as either of it's competitors, but it is cheap. Nintendo knows they don't need all the PS3's badass power to make a decent console. Games can still be enjoyable, and they've got their hyped up "interactive" gimmick. Lets hope they chunk that last part.

Regarding my optimistic dream of Nintendo chunking the Wii Remote, I know they won't do that. As a corporation, they're obligated to be financial whores and sell whatever the public will buy. Sales clearly indicate that most of the populace really does want to dance around like an idiot in front of their tvs. As Shigeru Miyamoto once said, "We want to get more people playing video games."

Real life Goriya Sighting

I've noticed that some of my friends look like enemies from Zelda. That's not a put down; I actually think it's pretty cool. I'm well aware that I probably look like the fairy from LoZ, so no need to go there. :P

I won't name names, but I've spotted the vuln arrow enemies from the dark world known as Goriya on my facebook friends list.

Alttp Arrows Goriya Cheese_Whiz

That's amazing. Rock on, friend that looks like Goriya.

It's a good idea for some Mary Sue-ish fanfic, or perhaps a fan movie, where someone's friends all sort of have that "Wizard of Oz" resemblance to characters from Zelda, and then some crazy magical event causes everyone to start acting like real life is Zelda.

Monday, October 4, 2010

The Hylian Language Institute

Most of my posts are rants about trivial issues, so I apologize to those of you who have grown fond of that. I'd like to take one post to recognize something that is astonishing, and truly worthy of adoration by all.

The Hylian Language Institute

This is a level of fandom that surpasses that of any known Zelda fan. We salute you, Kasuto of Ka'taan. *salute*

I want to learn and use this language, and perhaps even start posting all of my facebook statuses in it. We Zelda fans really need to start some cultural imperialism with this creation, and while we're at it petition Congress to replace the Dollar with the Rupee.

Respect.