John Walker's Electronic House

Galloway’s obviously been spouting some remarkably idiotic drivel – well, his entire career, but in this instance since his emerging from the Big Brother programme – but this really says everything. From the BBC News story:

‘Asked if he had been “naive” in thinking he would be given a platform for his views, he said: “I have been accused of many things in my life but naivety is not one of them”.‘

Um.

I’m not going to play a healer again.

We, as a people, sue hospitals. The degree of stupidity necessary for such an action should be impossible to grasp, so mind-destroyingly moronic we begin whirring, buzzing and emitting smoke from our circuits. Instead, we’re used to it, even resigned to it. It is in our international character. Ask anyone who’s ever played a healer in an MMOG.

My first appearance on The Escapist is up. It’s really just a revenge piece aimed at Kieron, for having relentlessly mocked my healing abilities in almost everything he’s written for about a year.

I’ve completely re-jigged the They’re Back archive, and added another 14 months’ worth of entries.

One of them includes ish 116, which was previously missing. Ishes 96 and 97 were the terrible dark months when I didn’t write the pages. The rest of the missing dates are due to a hard drive death, and maybe one day I’ll get around to sourcing the text from somewhere.

Someone remind me this time next month to add another.

Edit: I would like to stress that I enjoy being proven wrong, and will willingly back down if out-argued, or concede confusion if unbalanced from my position. I say this because so often it’s assumed that someone’s stating something means that they will refuse to listen or change their mind. Also, this is not a cop-out for the below. These are my thoughts that I’ve had and are what I think at the time of writing. I currently think I’m right.

I appear to have forgotten how to go to sleep, and so after two hours of lying still, wide awake, I got up and flicked around the internet, and noticed that Kieron had finally posted a response to the idiotic ramblings of some failed writer on Slashdot about how he doesn’t like any videogames journalism.

Which has broken the damn for the thought I’ve been throwing against the wall for the last few weeks, biting my tongue on, but now tired and pissed off, will share.

For those who haven’t followed the current eruption of the idiot volcano, it has become the terribly in thing to respond to any piece of videogames writing with, “well, it’s just one person’s opinion, and opinions are subjective…” Now, of course this is a thick seam of nonsense that constantly bubbles around under the ground, but it’s recently that I’ve noticed the caps blowing of the mountains as this lazy non-thought is spouted on every forum, blog and comments thread.

There are two key responses. One most people will refuse to stop and consider for even a second, the other I hope will receive some, “Ooh – yes”s.

1) We’ve killed the expert

People bandy around the phrase ‘post-modernism’ with little thought. I had entire modules of my degree with the phrase in their title, despite no one giving a useful description of what was so ‘post’ about it. In fact, in a splendid display of hyper-appropriateness, it is the very nature of what people mislabel ‘post-modernism’ that leads to its mislabelling as such. It has to be something New. Post-enlightenment, Modernism required that we search for the New; replace the previous and out-moded religious and authoritarian regimes with the emerging authority of science and the specific expert. Beliefs and opinions were no longer subjected upon you by a self-enforced higher power (of whatever form), but by seeking the thoughts of the educated and learned expert on the matter. Glorious times. But the value of the Expert was not the inherent nature of Modernism. Modernism was merely the drive to replace the current with the New. And so that which is identified as ‘post’ Modernism is merely Modernism continuing its usual pattern. We’re replacing the current with the New, and this time the current is the Expert, and the replacement the Individual.

It is manifested in multifarious forms, all-encompassing and suffocatingly prevalent. Take medicine. Modernism began by giving us the trained and qualified Doctor, from whom we sought medical attention for our ailments. But now, as Modernism recycles itself (let’s call it Mod2, although I’m sure one could identify many other previous stages), the Doctor is pushed into a small corner, his opinion merely that, and the opinions of many to be taken on board before the Individual decides which is ‘right for them’. This is how we now have flim-flam and con-artistry like homeopathy – whereby an ailment is treated by giving a substance that causes the ailment in a healthy person, diluted down until it doesn’t exist any more, to the ill person, in return for vast sums of money (these substances used to be known as ‘snake oil’) – accepted as equals. Yes, we’ll seek the advice of the specialist who has trained for eight years to become a doctor then spent twenty years in his specialty, but we’ll also ask the person who wants to sell us water, the lady who will wave magnets near us, and the man who pokes our toes. So what if none of these ‘alternative medicines’ have never been shown to have any demonstrable effect above placebo in any tests ever – that’s testing by OLD Science methods. We’ll decide which one we think is right.

This is one example amongst a million, and also within that collection appears games criticism. Oh yes, that’s right – I’m about to argue that I’m an Expert. Quickly, reject his statements, where’s his modesty?! How dare he! Please note: this is the reaction of Mod2 in action. The action of one person claiming Expert is now understood as a threatening attempt to rob the Individual. If I am Expert over you, then your opinion, you the Individual, are challenged for your Holy Status. Another’s Expert status is an affront on the Individualist totalitarianism. And this is the first reason the ridiculous argument is dragged out on every occasion.

My claim is hardly immense. I suggest Expertise in whether adventure games are good or bad. It can hardly be considered boasting. Having played almost every available adventure game of the last fifteen years, I claim training and knowledge, and from this, some authority on the subject. Others are more Expert than me on the subject. I look up to them, and seek to learn more from them. Richard Cobbett springs immediately to mind.

But this notion remains intolerable – it is to suggest that the Individual should listen to the Expert, and we’ve killed the Expert.

2) We won’t admit we like something bad

I hope this gets a more positive reaction. It follows on from the previous example, but to prevent the tiresome suggestion that this is self-aggrandisation, I shall leap genres and Experts.

I consider Tim Stone to be an Expert on strategy games. I don’t know strategy games at all well, and don’t especially enjoy playing them. Were I to play a strategy game that is widely considered amongst strategy game Experts to be extremely good, I would be very unlikely to get pleasure from playing it. Were I to apply the logic of stage 1, I should be able to categorically state, without fear of the possibility of contradiction, that this game is a bad game. It fails to entertain me, and so it is not good. Nevermind Tim’s extensive knowledge, experience and understanding of the genre, and his educated ability to identify its strengths and performance – I disagree, and I, the Individual, cannot be questioned or challenged. But that is still stage 1.

Stage 2 becomes relevant when I find a strategy game that is widely considered by Experts in the matter to be very poor, but I enjoy it very much. Stage 2 suggests that they are wrong to think it a bad strategy game, because I, the Individual, am getting pleasure from playing it, and therefore it must be good.

What I am missing is that it’s very possible that I might be getting pleasure from playing a bad game.

This, also, is intolerable to the Individual. It threatens the totalitarian regime. It suggests that faults exist. It at once accepts that the Individual’s response to something might not dictate its inherent quality, and suggests that the Expert’s alternative response might be right.

I hope that an example of this is more immediately palatable via pop music. Take The Corrs’, ‘Play It On The Radio’. Someone might well enjoy this song. They might associate it with happy memories, or simply derive pleasure from the painstakingly simplistic structure. It’s immediately accessible, it’s instantly possible to sing along with, and it’s so astonishingly cynically titled that it will receive endless, eternal radio play. Thus it will gain familiarity, popularity, and enjoyment. But does that make it a good piece of music? Does it merit 95% when measured against all music? Could you put it alongside Bach’s St. Matthew Passion and say, “these two are equally as good”?

I would hope all ridiculous protests would be dropped this far in, and one could say, “No, it’s not as good. But I still really enjoy it and want to listen to it.”

And good. That is very good. In this particular case, with this particular song, it makes me worry for you, and the entire music industry, but good. Because we’ve reached a point where we can accept that even though one might rather drill their ears than listen to Mozart, and like nothing better than dancing around our room singing the voice-synthesised harmonies of Westlife into our hairbrushes, they might still recognise that Mozart is a better composer than Ronan Keating.

So is it then not equally possible that while I might enjoy playing this woeful RTS, and yet get nothing out of a game of Rome: Total War, it’s perfectly acceptable for me to recognise that one is not better than the other simply because of my visceral response, and that I should trust the Expert on this matter over my own ill-informed and under-educated reaction?

Conclusion

People are reacting angrily to every review they read, and indeed the simple existence of reviews, because they are now perceived as threats against their Individualist Holiness.

For one last time, in case it has not been clear, this is not a piece to say: ‘Everyone should listen to me because I’m an Expert and they’re idiots who don’t know anything’. This is a piece to say: Recognise those who are Experts, and accept that their Expertise is not a threat to you, that your Individualism is your lonely death, and that enjoying something bad does not make it good.

So we can get rid of comment threads on reviews now, can’t we?

New Copyright Watch up.

12 January 1988

On Tuesdays my friend Alastair Caple and his sister Sarah come to our house for tea after school because his mum works late and so there is no one to look after him anywhere else. We used to play Ghostbusters in the garden but now we are too grown up for Ghostbusters so instead we play on my dad’s computer in the kitchen. Games we like include Outrun and Buggy Boy but best of all Bubble Bobble.

Imitation is the sincerest form of not being able to think of your own ideas. Mrs Trellis demonstrates with some of her own Rules for life.

Actually, lots of these Rules are really good, and I want to steal them. Others however are about bras and defending driving slowly, which are best ignored.

More guides for living.

(Oh, and a note to everyone who keeps telling me I’m too miserable and grumpy. Most of these Rules are now being suggested by other people. I’m just telling the people what the people want the people to know).

#26 You call people the name they tell you. If someone is introduced as ‘Nicholas’, then they’re ‘Nicholas’, and not ‘Nick’, until they tell you they can be. And by the way, this goes for countries too. What on earth is with this crazed renaming of nations into our own tongue? Really, we’re still not at a point where we can show enough respect to call a country by the name the people who live in the country call it?

England: No no no, it’s sweet that you think you’re called ‘Deutschland’, but actually it’s ‘Germany’. You know, as in ‘Germanic’.

Deutschland: Well, we’re doing fine with Deutschland.

England: Aw, how endearing. Well, that’s nice and all, but it’s Germany.

#27 If you don’t have everything with you that you need in order to smoke, you don’t get to smoke. Bring what you need for your ridiculous behaviour when you go out. Really – you smoke, but you don’t have a means of setting the thing on fire? Really?

#28 You leave a message on the second call. Any third calls in a row will now cause instant disease. If you need to get hold of someone, such that it would warrant needing to phone them three times in one half hour, you leave a damn message on the second failed attempt. What’s your plan? Wear them down? They’re not answering because they want to see if you really mean it? OR MAYBE THEY’RE BUSY AND CAN’T ANSWER THE PHONE.

#29 Don’t ask people, “Could you remind me to…” Just remember for yourself. Someone doesn’t become accountable for your continued possession of margarine simply because you said to them, “Could you remind me to get margarine?” Here’s who having margarine is important to: you. So stop passing the responsibility for running the minutiae of your life onto those around you, and just write it down on a piece of paper. Yourself.

#30 Which means it’s actually ok to make the lame-ass joke as follows:

Lazy person: Could you remind me to get more matches?
Innocent person: Remember to get more matches.

Yes, it’s not funny at all. But it’s punishment for breaking Rule #29.

#31 While using a mobile phone, you are never to discuss the mobile phone you are using.

#32 You’re not allowed to use the word ‘actually’ any more. You never, ever need it. It’s a wasted word, a waste of everyone’s time. Scientists have shown that the average person uses the word ‘actually’ over 70,000 times a year, wasting 45 hours which could otherwise be used to scream at people who say ‘actually’. I expect. As for ‘basically’… Are you using those toenails?

While The Onion hasn’t been essential reading for many years now, its straight review section, the AV Club, has become increasingly required.

Here, in an attempt to become the Anti-Kieron, is a link to their excellent “Least Essential Albums Of 2005” rundown, chronicling not the worst albums of the year, but the least necessary.

LEAST ESSENTIAL 2PACSPLOITATION

In a shocking lapse in his once-remarkable posthumous work ethic, Tupac Shakur somehow failed to put out a new album this year: It appears that dying in 1995 is finally starting to catch up with him. But the exploiting-Tupac’s-memory industry chugged on, releasing The Rose Vol. 2, a sequel to 2000’s The Rose That Grew From Concrete, which gave his work the tweedy poetry-recital treatment. Yes, loyal soldiers in 2Pac’s thug army can all but smell the white wine and fancy cheese as Ludacris favors listeners with a recitation of 2Pac’s middle-school-level verse, then offers his interpretation of the poem’s meaning. What’s next? Round The World/Same Song: Music Inspired By 2Pac’s Cameo In Nothing But Trouble?

Remember when you were a kid, and you had those crazy bendy-flap pin clip things? I’ve got a feeling they have a proper name, but I’m also fairly sure that they slip out of existence once you’re past the age of 12, unless you become a primary school teacher when you’re allowed to see them again, so it doesn’t really matter. You’d push them through a hole in two bits of card, and then bend the two flaps of metal back against the flat surface, so the two were attached, but could rotate around. And of course you’d be doing this to make a little person with pose-able limbs. And then you could colour it in. Then it would be time for break, and you’d graze your knee. Which you never do any more. Not even primary school teachers still graze their knee. But what were primary schools doing covering their playgrounds with loose, sharp gravel? My theory: playgrounds were paid for by sticking plaster companies – an investment to ensure business stayed good. I’m on to you Elastoplast – your reign of tyranny against the patellae of the under-12s will soon come to an end.

Possibly one of the more strange reviews I’ve written.