I've moved this animation blog over to Blogspot: http://gunwhale.blogspot.com/

Hopefully I can get some feedback on my work from John Kricfalusi's blog; he's also on blogspot, as are some friends.

Not finished, but enough to fulfill the Emotional Ties brief.

Sorry, I'm stealing the descriptions for these from my deviantART.

(Couldn't find a decent original online)

What a failure. Mostly, I desaturated this because of a mishap. Ever done that thing where you reach for a marker, only half-looking what you're doing and grab the one next to it? DOESN'T THAT SUCK? Well, "Pastel Pink" is not the subtle skintone "Blush" is, and made all the others I used decidedly orange when layed over. :(

Other mistakes: The first, is that I should start choosing better art to copy from. This was a tiny black and white image in my instruction manual, and it has no clear line-of-action nor any negative space to speak of, meaning I had a tougher time than with the prince. Also, I need a better grey marker. Face is utter crap, I couldn't see it.

But the trousers are nice.



Preston Blair exercise; deconstructing Bug Bunny. Or, as I have drawn; A disaster. I appear to be getting worse.

Mistakes:
- Head too small
- Line of action not curved enough (It was one of many tries though )
- 'Bean' shape for body too tall
- Between legs should make a straight line, not the curve seen here
- Muzzle too big, eyes should be lower down, larger forehead area
- Bottom of sweater comes down too low
- Left foot too flat
- Right ear too thin



To be honest, this one is only just a failure.

Porky's head is way too small, but at least it looks like him. One main mistake was the fly character; his line-of action should be his spine -- which was the intention, but when I was constructing his body around it I though "nah, that's too extreme". It wasn't -- the characters should be closer together at the feet.

So two notable mistakes... but it fails because the head size one is a really big mistake to make.

It was with a slightly weightier heart and a great deal of humility that I had to admit to myself; I need to learn how to draw.

More from observation, I think. Especially of people. Being very alone, I decided to see about a pose from a game cover.



I've made some mistakes. But it's a learning process.

In response to my friend Charlotte's blog post: charlottewhite.blogspot.com/2009/05/shadow-of-colossus-as-art-form.html

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I might have to write a full-on mini dissertation on games as an artform. I joke about it, but actually have a lot to say on the matter.

The crux of it is this; from my point of view, whenever I see something (like BAF Game, a good example) which is trying to draw attention to games as a form of art, the focus is ALWAYS on things like character sketches and designs. Visual arts. This is futile, and like judging the salad purely on the arrangement on the plate, and the dressing; not the flavour.

As anyone who plays games can note, the interactivity can bring in a completely different experience than is afforded in entertainment media, period. The sense of satisfaction when removing four lines with the long-block in Tetris, the adrenaline rush of racing round a loop with sneakers in Sonic, the very first shotgun-headshot in Resident Evil; juxtaposed against such emotive moments as running completely out of ammo in RE, getting cornered by ghosts in Pac Man, and having your healer die JUST before delivering that do-or-die group heal in any RPG - they deliver an experience that is as unique, but no more or less valuable, compared to participating in an area-specific installation, or marveling at the pacing and mood of a decent film.

The problem, I feel, is that the people trying to 'push' games as an artform are trying to do so with modern ones that were market-driven and therefore aimed at (arguably) the masses; ergo, the lowest common denominator, meaning they can never be appreciated as 'high' art. Good examples to use, I feel, would be things like Dave Theurer's nightmare-inspired wireframe frenzy, Tempest; Ed Logg's minimalist, but utterly captivating, Asteroids; Eugene Jarvis' claustrophobia-inducing panic attack of a videogame, Robotron 2084.

But many are put off by the side-effects of them being borne of primitive electronic hardware; garish colours, simple shapes and the dreaded 'beeps and boops'.

And these examples are all from one specific age; the early age of arcade gaming. Again, this can be argued that it's a lowest-common-denominator thing - although not within the context of their relevance today.

And the videogame industry isn't really helping itself by setting out to be a poor echo of that which Hollywood achieved some twenty years or so ago; games are not films, they're more participatory than that; so by lumping in a (often long-winded) plot, they're diluting the one thing that makes them unique; the actual GAME part of the games.

It's an industry that is still growing, still maturing. I personally see the push for them to be considered 'an artform' to be akin to the teenager whining that it isn't fair, and they should be treated like an adult.

Since videogames have been a dominant interest of mine for as long as I can remember, I shall be taking more than a cursory glance in their direction. Recently, I decided to revisit the Prince of Persia Trilogy for PlayStation2; a series of games which I have had for a while, but didn't play through in their entirety -- I managed to sit through the first game, and struggled to keep interested in the second, leaving the third unplayed.

Recently, I decided to have another look and ask myself "what was wrong with that second title?" and attempt the trilogy, again.

PRINCE OF PERSIA - THE SANDS OF TIME



Long have I been at odds with those who think a good story makes a good game. To them, I bring up Tetris (A design classic, and loved around the world) and it's purity in ludology. This often fails to make an impact, as they bring up whatever Final Fantasy game they love the most and it's "amazing" plot. To be honest, no Final Fantasy game has a good plot.

Well, Sands of Time is a game that *does* have a good plot, and the way the game is structured around it is something of a marvel. Gameplay itself is essentially Tomb Raider: The Parkour Version, with some shoehorned combat thrown in for good measure; which works, but only just. I found using the Dagger of Time and the meta-resource management aspect this brings in much more entertaining than learning the combos, or rote-learning the enemy attack patterns.

The actual Sands of Time themselves take a lot of the stress out of what could be an annoying array of trial-and-error sections, by allowing you to 'rewind' the last 8 seconds or so, correcting any mistakes that have been made. Also, a use the developers probably didn't intend was that the sands can be used to reconnoiter an area in lieu of some questionable camera choices.

The story itself, though; it's a pretty shallow affair, all things considered - but it's the delivery of it that entrances me. To start with, you are outside an Indian woman's bedroom, and walk in, beginning to tell a story to her, the plot of the game. You are the titular Prince, and tell of a raid on an Indian city, a treacherous vizier, and the sands themselves; and how you ultimately use them to prevent the whole thing from happening, before returning the dagger, which is why you enter the room to tell the story in the first place.

It's a little clumsily delivered in places, and the voice acting is only adequate, but it never fails to tease at what happens next; kept me playing. One thing the game did absolutely correctly was give the Prince a mighty sword toward the end making all the combat a breeze; if there's one thing I believe in games, it's that the last stretch is essentially the start of the ending, so torturing the player with all the hardest traps yet is NOT the way to go; instead, focus on all the pretties and give the player a good time, wind them down to prepare for sitting back and taking in a story wrapped up well. And wrapped up well this is.

PRINCE OF PERSIA - THE WARRIOR WITHIN



I think marketing failed here. Throw out the storytelling; focus on the combat, throw out the excellent middle-eastern flavoured soundtrack; shovel in some generic heavy metal riffs, throw out the mood and ambience; pile in the DARK AND MURKY.

Add to that the fact that there's a past/present gimmick forcing you to essentially play each section twice (one a 'remixed' version of the other) and here's a title that is no fun AT ALL.

PRINCE OF PERSIA - THE TWO THRONES



So, I skipped that awful second title, and approached this one with caution. Apparently the combat had another overhaul, so I wasn't exactly kicking my heels with glee at the prospect of learning more stuff. But wait, something happened -- the plot here is told as a story again, this time with a character rescued from The Warrior Within. Yeah, about that; it's all recapped briefly in the intro, so skipping it altogether is FINE; it's like the developers realised their faux pas.

"Yeah, Devil May Cry was doing well, so we made it more like that. Well, not everyone likes Devil May Cry, and many seek other games. LIKE OUR GAMES. We killed the work experience kid who had the idea, and got back to making a proper middle-eastern game again"

Which they did. The ambience is back, although more intensely conveying a war-torn Babylon, with an accompanying soundtrack that wouldn't sound wrong played to some Harryhausen stop-motion skeletons, and all manner of awesome cliches bought in; a giant in a fighting arena; a couple of CHARIOT RACES. Although the plot really doesn't have more depth than The Sands of Time (Prince battles with darker inner self bought on from exposure to the sands. Woo.) it's delivered in a cinematic way that delivers enough of an audiovisual massage to make me want to keep playing. The only problems I can see are some of the (especially earlier) jumping sections are a little *too* trial-and-error, and that the combat takes too long. This latter one isn't so bad with the new stealth gameplay, though.

Now, stealth is a thing I *hate* in games. Having to sit there working out an enemy movement pattern a few times to memorise when and where is the best time and place to move... it's not fun. Now, if there's an alternate way around; like with Prince of Persia's ledge-hopping; this isn't so bad. Add to that the new Speed Kills, and there's an alternate way (usually) around the pattern-recognition-cum-button-bashing combat I so abhor.

So it's not bad at all. I haven't quite completed it yet, but I'm drawing toward the end. Let's see how this goes, but I've enjoyed it thus far.

Here's an experiment; I tend to get ideas based on fucked up dreams I have, I either save them for future projects (indeed, I'm making a 100-page graphic novel based on such a dream I had over a year ago). So, I have a TV series idea based on my recent weirdass dream.

WITCHFINDER

Yeah, unoriginal title may change.

Basically, it's set in the 15th century, shortly before the Salem witch hunts.The main dude is a witchfinder, patterned after the main guy the Witchfinder General; and he has been, for all his adult life so far, travelling from village to village to ease them of their 'witch' problems, by identifying the women of questionable virtue who need to be burned at the stake, or drowned.

This is making him a good income, until a spat with a rival witchfinder cause he himself to be accused of witchcraft, and he has to flee. This causes him to question his practice, since he knows he has never practiced witchcraft, and is innocent. But what of the women he'd condemmed?

So, under the guise of the witchfinder, he now goes from village to village and finds the *real* problem; usually mayoral corruption or double-dealing, and those who are about to expose it are accused and tried of heresy and witchcraft; so the TV show would play itself as sort of a medieval CSI; except with all the bullshit technology and scientific terms NOBODY has heard of replaced by the low-tech sort of detective work one could do without, meaning people would relate to it more.

Later on in the series, the witchfinder could actually find out that there ARE INDEED real witches, with real powers, and it is only his detective abilities that unearth them. But can his common sense stand up against REAL MAGIC?

So yeah, it'd probably be like some bizarre cross between Xena, Buffy and CSI. I don't know. What do you think?

(Note: I have too much on at the moment to make anything of this idea. If it doesn't suck, it gets written down and stuck in a box XD)

It will always be futile to understand what goes on in the male psyche, that is if there is the assumption that there is the presence of anything higher than purely base and hormone-driven impulses. Which there isn't. These video games are a perfect example of what the male demographic sees as the perfect world.

Let's look at Streets of Rage; allegedly a 'classic' by chauvinist standards, this is a game which is based around the premise of hitting womyn. With a baseball bat. You can control one of three characters, the Aryan wonderboy Axel, his ethic-minority slave Adam and an indentured lady in tow by the name of Blaze. This in itself shows the low intellect of the human manboy; we have a nazi with a rock star name, a BAD attempt to subvert and mock the 'mitochondrial Eve' theory and a mockery of hot flushes, which are a normal thing for middle-aged womyn. They might just have named her 'Yeast Infection', but the men who develop videogames are obviously illiterate, hence the absolute lack of a story in this game.

The discrimination only BEGINS there, however; as left-handed people and vegetarians are attacked - the crux of the game being to move toward the right, living solely on a diet or cooked chicken. And the main attraction? Fighting. Intellectual womyn (you know what I mean. ALL OF US) may want to look elsewhere because there is no peaceful alternative to these altercations, just hitting and hitting. Every now and again, there will be assistance from a police officer in a car some 100 yards back, with that ultimate phallic symbol of the male power trip and oppressive intent - a very big gun.

Of course this game is all about male desire. There is no equality here; the men are all portrayed as athletic sex-symbols at the peak of their fighting game with gruff voices, and the womyn are unfairly portrayed as sex symbols, who fight with the men and have athletic physiques. Purely this was originally conceived in a much more primitive era, because when hit, the womyn (who wear S&M clothing, further strengthening the sexist ideology at work here, and appealing more to the never-ending male libido) cry weakly when hit.



There's not much more to it, really. One only has to play through a few levels to see that the game is a monotonous affair. Walk and hit things. The end-of-level overlords get more and more muscular as the game goes on, without even the presence of an overweight male (perish the thought) or even womyn who can put up a decent fight. The locations betray the male ideology was well, being all streets and beaches, never once implying that men should give up fighting and do an honest day's work in their lives (even a factory or similar would be welcome). This is sexist trash, and any man caught playing it (because no woman who respects herself would dare to even think it) should be hung by the testicles, drawn and quartered for supporting this vile filth.

FEMINISM RATING: A beautiful, vagina-shaped ZERO out of ten.

I just beat Phantasy Star Portable. It's not bad at all, in fact it makes me want to play all the way through the second PS2 title, Ambition of the Illuminous, all over again. Which is pretty much because the story leaves off RIGHT THERE. It's sort of weird Sega making this a sort of "Episode 1.5", but since the original Phantasy Star Universe was not so popular, I guess they had to introduce new players SOMEHOW... although since AotI left me with one humdinger of a cliffhanger, I'm not sure this was enough.

Okay, so unappealing brat Ethan Waber is again consigned to minor character status, so you don't have to worry about his stoner-brat-manchild mannerisms and "Thanks for getting in the way...", but the clumsy way in which Sega have decided to deliver the universe to new players leaves a lot to be desired. Basically, new robot chick Vivienne doesn't know JACK SHIT, so has to be told everything in baby terms. Thrice. Yeah, this is pretty darn tootin' for people who've never played a Phantasy Star Universe game, but I'm sure there are better and OPTIONAL ways to explain why things are the way they are, really.



But here's the deal; solo play is merely the taster for what is apparently an awesome multiplayer experience. Well, I wouldn't know. Sega like to charge for the privelege, so I haven't bothered. What I can imagine it being is WELL AWESOME, because beating up gigantic beetle things with lazer swords whilst your mate sets them on fire really appeals to me, but not so much that I'd pay a monthly subscription, just in case. Well roll on PS:P, because you can play for free with three other dudes or dudettes who also bought the game... or, not. Because maybe they were put off by the idea of paying for multiplayer first time around.

Bah, whatever. So, what is left in the game is a bunch of poor characterisation (drum up a YouTube search for "Phantasy Star Portable Maya's Chest" to see what I mean) and a weak story in what *could* have been a truly epic game. The setting is there, the game mechanics have evolved to the point where they're truly enjoyable, but since the focus is on multiplayer (and not the weak solo quest) and Sega HAVEN'T REALLY BEEN SELLING THAT SO WELL, I guess this is another Phantasy Star game I'll be playing alone.

So, Sega? I think the lessons you can take from this are; great universe let down by poor storytelling, and a focus on charging for any real gameplay. AND BRING US CHEAPSKATES WHO DON'T WANT TO PAY YOUR SILLY FEES THE LAST PART OF THE STORY. Seriously, even if it's a purchase on an actual disc and everything. Then I might be able to enjoy it again when I'm old and grey and don't care how bad your shitty voice actors are.

WHAT THE FUCK DID I JUST WATCH?

In the future, the pollution is causing organs to fail, but GENECO is there to supply new ones... for loan. And well, better pay up or fear them being REPOSESSED.

Add this premise of gothic sci-fi with some blood 'n' gore horror, mixed with constructivist comic book imagery and the fact THAT IT IS A MUSICAL, and what do you get?

Simply, the most unusual and campy thing I've seen recently. And I fucking love it. Paris Hilton as a drugged-up plastic surgery addict, whose face falls off in the middle of a song? Giles from Buffy as a Repo Man who rips out an indebted customer's guts, only to reach into him and make him 'sing' like a glove puppet to a song? Bill Moseley, who played Otis Driftwood in The Devil's Rejects, actually SINGING "I'm the smartest // I'm the toughest // I'll find a hole and fuck it // If there ain't one // I'll make one (stabs a guy) // Luigi don't take shit from no one!"? I have no words to express my new-found love <3

Seriously, if you want something that is so completely unlike anything you've ever seen, check this out. Please, do. :)