Wisdom’s Finality: The Beginning of the End

Here today, gone tomorrow

Probably the same sentiment the UAC used to pitch
the idea of how destructive the BFG 9000 would be,
and how little of any reality would be left of anything
that was hit by a bullet fired from the weapon

Yesterday’s post ended up being inaccurately titled by endeavors end, as I didn’t really do a deep dive into my wayward feelings of anxiety that seemed to be troubling me when I was lamenting about what kind of writeup I was going to commit to. I guess you could consider my queer sense of reservation in wanting to speak about Doom: The Dark Ages while also simultaneously not wanting to provide spoilers for the first time ever on ATE as part of the odd sense of gloom I referenced to make the whole thing fit together. You also probably didn’t think about it till I brought it up just now. The tragedy of it all, not unlike running out of ammo for your favorite weapon kinds of tragic.

The only thing more horrifying than having gas
in the chainsaw is not having gas in the chainsaw

I guess in staying within the realm of the morose, this post is about some minor idea of gloom, but only in a small sense, as it represents the last post I’m going to do on ATE…or at least, this version of ATE. The tl;dr of the whole matter is that in returning to writing for the site, I did want to prove to myself that returning to writing about video games was actually something I wanted to do again, and then grow readership thereafter. Problem is, due to dry arbitrary reasons, I’m not really able to do it with this version of Active Time Event, meaning I had to go and acquire a new domain in order for potential growth to happen. Even though that site is basically in its infancy, it is now officially active, though quite bereft of content, save for a couple of placeholders for reasons.

In any case, it would obviously be quite daft of me to keep posting articles for this version of ATE when I have a newer version up, so this is basically…it. Barring some bizarre circumstance of reason, this will be the last post I do on this version of ATE…ever Sadly, I will not be able to migrate the 13 years of posts worth of content from here to there, so there won’t be any way to really move all of these legacy articles onto the new site. Luckily, this version will remain active for however long WordPress will keep hosting it, so my old work will remain to be enjoyed for the foreseeable future.

For obvious reasons, this whole thing is somewhat bittersweet, but any chance I have of potentially growing readership lies within the newer version of ATE, so the way forward seems obvious. Looking back in reflection, and to wrap this whole thing up with some sense of full circle return, my first post on ATE, on September 12th, 2012, made mention of a Virtual Odyssey taking place, and all of the value that may follow in it’s wake. Now that I look back on more than a dozen years of writing work, I have to wonder: did I accomplish anything worthwhile?

I’m not sure. That’s life. Oh well I guess. As I’ve said in the past and will continue to say into the distant future; existence is spilled milk.

See you on the other side, and remember: Don’t Panic.

(To be continued…on ATE.)

-Pashford S. Murano

Doom and Gloom

Oscar Wilde said “we are each our own devil, and we make this world our hell.”

The mention of Doomguy kind of ruins the metaphor by
making actual hell his world, so I think Wilde maintains
prescient insight on this one

To address anyone paying attention: yes, yesterdays post was a meager helping of miniscule proportions, and most certainly represented a rush job if there ever was one on ATE. I tend to go through phases of creative endeavor and struggles of personal self-worth, which I will usually see reflected in my posting regularity. Some months I’m satisfied writing seldomly and only when I’m in that ideal sweet spot of feeling ready to launch directly into the stratosphere of self-actualization, other months I’m either inspired enough or personally forceful in my own work ethic to write every single day, in the name of “progress”.

Progress looking like a confusing mess at times

That’s the thing I suppose, in an ideal world, I would always just be primed and ready to write about video games and only video games. I’ve never known this world to be ideal, and thus we are left with the barren reality that lays before us, one where even getting out of bed should be considered a massive victory, for better or worse. A small update on Doom: The Dark Ages to keep this relatively grounded in gaming chatter, I still have not finished the game, in spite of my best efforts. On work days especially, it can be difficult to find time to get anywhere in my current rotation, and to give you an idea of just how difficult, I’ve been on the same level in The Dark Ages for three days now. I reference difficulty only in the matter of finding time, not ingame challenge mind you, finding only enough moments to basically complete a single encounter before needing to shut it down, and that’s mostly just to say I still actually played the fucking thing on that given day. The one thing I could potentially talk about of interest that has some conversational merit was an element of The Dark Ages that was left purposefully obscured to me before I played it, making its eventual reveal a nice surprise. This thusly leads me to the notion of not wanting to spoil it for y’all at the current moment in time, going full circle, right back to not having anything to talk about in the world of Doom.

Pictured: this spoiler thing I can’t talk about right now?
Super cool. Trust me.

Aside from the thing that will not be mentioned, another small updated to mention is in the form of an actual update, with the director of TDA’s game development, Hugo Martin, streaming about info involving an update helping polishing the entire experience, some of the enhancements including the balancing of higher difficulty levels, which should come as a delight for any of the masochists cutting their teeth on Nightmare and beyond. He also mentioned that some of the elements of the gameplay tweaks, outside of an “official” update, don’t require a patch to implement, with Martin referencing “tunables”, his pet name for some behind the scenes fine tuning that allowed the adjustments to be made silently and on the fly. I’m wondering how many devs do something similar without any mention of such a reality, and how these small changes end up driving players absolutely fucking nuts in the process.

The face out of the loop gamers are probably
making when that thing they practiced 500 times
suddenly isn’t working after id software messes around
with their “tunables”

Outside of the small improvements to be made mention of, the game has predictably reviewed well, ranging in the 80-90’s range of quality, and scored more than 3 million players during launch, providing leaps and bounds of faster turn around player involvement than Eternal offered. Of course, a big part of this was Gamepass, in having The Dark Ages available day one for players to try, which does leave people wondering if this is enough to qualify TDA as “profitable” as Eternal was, which is really only a concerning problem for shareholders and money makers. When it comes down to it, a fun video game being more widely available for a greater audience on the cheap is pretty much just a net positive, isn’t it?

Normally, I would admonish a dismissal of not pushing for further inquiry into a matter or calling off the dogs of aggressive curiosity in terms of deconstructing deeper meanings behind a happening. However, and perhaps I’m just feeling a yearning for the simplicity of optimism in a moment of drained defeat, perhaps its okay that the take away with The Dark Ages launch is that from a pure numbers standpoint, a greater number of people are getting a chance to enjoy the title…

…and maybe that’s enough.

-Pashford

One M.A.D Theory Behind Doom’s Design

Nietzsche said “Hell is oneself”


I’d tend to agree, but especially if this man was
having the same thought

If you’ve been keeping up with me for the last week, you’ll know that I have been raging through hell, leaving few stones unturned over and even fewer demons unturned inside out. The Dark Ages has been quite the romp thus far, and it’s clear developer id software focusing on just the single player content and dropping multiplayer definitely paid off in dividends in crafting a thoroughly spectacular campaign experience. Not only does every level feel like it’s got something new to introduce to play around with, but the entire single player feels polished to a glistening sheen, and optimized to hell and back. The loading is basically nonexistent, the graphics maintain their intensity, and the frame rate never stutters, all the while taking place on massive battlefields against gigantic hordes from the terrifying beyond.


This level of hell featuring: blood-curdling nightmares,
visceral agony, unfathomable dread, and DMV lines

From a performance standpoint (on the Xbox Series X, mind you), the game is golden, one of the best efforts I’ve seen up to this point on the system, in keeping moment to moment gameplay relentlessly frenetic, so props to id software for delivering so magnificently in that regard. While I have been playing The Dark Ages (TDA), I’ve been mulling over some of core design elements of the game itself, kind of a how we got from point a to point b scenario, from Eternal to TDA, and I alluded to this notion a couple of posts back with this metaphoric sentiment:

“I think this notion of simplification, going from Eternal to Dark Ages, lends itself to a much bigger idea I had that I will dive into in greater detail in the next couple days, but the basic premise of what I surmised is rooted in the idea of a reaction to a reaction, in terms of how the devs ended up designing around the perceived player anxieties surrounding what Eternal had to offer. There were some fairly serious lines drawn in the sand, vocally speaking, about what players felt worked and did not work in Eternal, and I think this broadcasted crystallization process was both acknowledged by id on just how the “royal” players comfort zone existed, the zoning mechanisms that affected their regality, the kingdom they wished to occupy, and very much how they wished to rule within it. With this in mind, we see thusly the move towards designing Dark Ages around this kingly rejection, by pairing down the entire experience in a reductionist approach in narrowing Doom’s horizons instead of broadening them.“

Flowery language aside, though I think it is worth it to mention that while I may have perhaps been gratuitous in my verbiage, I maintained a cohesive point through out in laying the ground work for what I was referencing, and that was in reference to my “M.A.D Theory” involving why TDA ended up being designed the way it was.


Like a demon’s crass ass strapped with sassy brass
kinds of mad

To elaborate; M.A.D in “M.A.D Theory” stands for “Marauder Anxiety Disorder”, and I think represents a probable cornerstone of why TDA turned out the way it did. See, for anyone out of the loop or straight up doesn’t recall, the Marauder was a very particular enemy who debuted in Eternal that players ended up entirely loathing and complaining about so much, id software essentially apologized for his overpowered ways by nerfing him super early on. This was due to how players seemingly could not stand toe to toe with the Marauder in straight up combat, and forced the players to mindfully and patiently maneuver against, in order to wait to for their moment to strike to deliver fatal blows.


Something wicked this way comes

In reference to my initial premise above, I think his eventual nerfing (and readdressing) created a knock on effect that would go on to influence the very essence of development in making TDA what it ended up being. To borrow from psychoanalysis, there is something called transference and counter-transference, and its the idea that the analysand can project emotions and desires onto the analyst, which allows both to basically explore the unconscious conflicts that have sprung up in a safe environment. In a very loose sense, I think how the players reacted to The Marauder let id software explore the very depths of their own design as felt through the player, and the reaction that thusly followed was one of an epic whiplash that reverberated throughout the entire experience of TDA.


This parry brought to you by the Marauder

With id software course correcting with how the Marauder was designed, they realized they shouldn’t throw the baby out with the bathwater, and salvaged what essentially was an imperfect design that could be refined and honed to perfection. One of the fundamental issues underlying the Marauders design was twofold; firstly that he was an outlier within a system that wasn’t custom tailored to train the player to deal with his methodology with the rhythmic patience it desired, and second, it did rob the player of some agency by disrupting the regular power trip that both Doom and by extension Eternal represented by not giving enough tools to the player to properly command the situation, a moment that with it, lacked a confident reaction with which to give the player a proper upper-hand they were so use to having in this hellish context. With more framework and a better tool-set prefacing the battle with the Maruader, you’d give the players a chance in reversing their fortunes at the right moment, and re-empowering them with well-timed skills, leading to a successful execution of plan A.


As opposed to going with the ill-advised plan B,
which is the whole eating shit plan

Thus, the new gameplay loop for TDA was born. Not only that, but with an extra focus and refinement on the approach to Marauder Anxiety Disorder being successfully overcome, a brand new way of approaching all combat, now with both a shield in hand and a parry in tow helped to celebrate a new way of razing hell along with it. All that was left to do was to further color coordinate the telegraphed attacks so that you could apply the same design economics to the entire army of the demonic horde, and you’ve successfully tweaked the entire experience to accommodate for a far more rhythmically fueled, tool-set empowered, skill enhanced complexity that reframes the entire battlefield. If it weren’t for so many being stricken with a M.A.D in response to one of Eternal’s most controversial enemies, you wouldn’t end up having such an innovative, retooled system with which to deal with all the demons in The Dark Ages that would follow suit.

One “M.A.D Theory” is another man’s design ethics, and could be a contributing factor to how Eternal’s follow up became what it was. Sometimes, it’s failure that leads to success. Mad, innit?

~Pashford

Words of Wisdom: Fail Faster

Sometimes, we make the mistake of not being able to see the forest for the trees.


We nicknamed the chainsaw “perspective” to help
add context to this visual metaphor

Here on Active Time Event, we routinely advocate for rationality, and all that follows suit. Normally, my small posits involving words of wisdom are small insights that may help imbue your everyday thinking processes with a well needed shot to the arm of renewed vigor, which is something of dire need from time to time. Today, I reference my recent write ups involving Doom: The Dark Ages in sharing this simple sentiment: fail faster. Not that I think Dark Ages is a “failure” per say, as the game is reviewing well, people seem to be generally happy with it, and the game is likley to go on and sell millions. I myself have also enjoyed my time with the title thus far, though I think there is an underlying notion that Dark Ages perhaps is maybe under delivering where Eternal effortlessly thrived. In this one way, Dark Ages could certainly be looked at as “failing”, in a sense, as the title tried something new, didn’t quite hit the mark, and perhaps will be seen as a slight stumble in terms of the series moving forward. However, and in spite of the idea that this kind of “fail” does carry with it the weight of some negativity, the silver lining is that developer id wasn’t afraid to try something new, and in their quest to heighten their craft, deliver a compelling product, and push themselves to continue to experiment with the self-identity of the series of Doom, and are now the wiser for it.

Just like a talented musical artist may not want to make the exact same album or type of music over and over again, destined to evolve into new sounds and methods of creation, game developers as well will push the boundaries of what they’re capable of, how they want to continue to create, and will try new things in the name of progress. Ultimately, I don’t think I would have wanted to just play Eternal 2.0, and I think even if Dark Ages tends to be considered a misstep in the grand scheme of things, and in some ways looked at as failing to deliver on the heights Eternal did, I think there was a lot to enjoy and benefit from through the entire process, and grants us further perspective that trying something different can still have satisfying results, even if it doesn’t turn out to be the best thing ever. We’d all be so lucky to “fail” in the same way Dark Ages could be considered to have in this regard, and I think helps to create a compelling reinforcement to my initial premise and my words of wisdom: fail faster.

Take care of yourself, and each other.

~Pashford

Pondering Over Fire and Brimstone Pt.2

They say hell is other people.

The people saying this forget that to others,
they too, are other people. It’s demons all the
way down

So many thoughts about Doom: The Dark Ages, and so little time in which to dwell within them. In another moment of nearly none to spare, I still felt queer not sharing a shred of a notion about The Dark Ages before I was to jet off to work, though I assure you, a much larger amalgam of thoughts are laying dormant, just waiting for their opportunity to strike. In the immediate now however, I think I refocus on the notion of how stripped down, “grounded” if you will, both in a literal and metaphoric sense, The Dark Ages is comparatively to Eternal, and just how much that contrast helped frame the design mechanics for The Dark Ages in it’s ground up machinations.

I think this notion of simplification, going from Eternal to Dark Ages, lends itself to a much bigger idea I had that I will dive into in greater detail in the next couple days, but the basic premise of what I surmised is rooted in the idea of a reaction to a reaction, in terms of how the devs ended up designing around the perceived player anxieties surrounding what Eternal had to offer. There were some fairly serious lines drawn in the sand, vocally speaking, about what players felt worked and did not work in Eternal, and I think this broadcasted crystallization process was both acknowledged by id on just how the “royal” players comfort zone existed, the zoning mechanisms that affected their regality, the kingdom they wished to occupy, and very much how they wished to rule within it. With this in mind, we see thusly the move towards designing Dark Ages around this kingly rejection, by pairing down the entire experience in a reductionist approach in narrowing Doom’s horizons instead of broadening them.

Within this modality of thought, and tackling the herculean notion of recontextualizing Doom in facing the larger zeitgeist with meaningful vigor, developer id’s idea of reinventing the maniacally fashioned swiss army knife that the Doom Slayer ended up representing in Eternal, and went a different direction for The Dark Ages by aggressively whittling the great Slayers stature into a good old fashioned battering ram. The interesting knock on effect of course radically transforms the very reality of problems players will be put up against, in considering what obstacles may be surmounted when one contrasts the difference of effectiveness in how a Swiss army knife and a battering ram can be applied. This change in dimensionality ends up altering the texture of issues by creating a new context for hell that will thusly follow. All of this in the name of carving out a frame of reference to distinguish those player comfort zone preferences that helped to transform the direction The Dark Ages took in the first place, a moment of transference and counter-transference laid bare.

More thoughts to come…

-Pashford

The Greasy Reality of Mario Kart World

These days, I feel quite off when I’m not framing my gaming articles through the lens of philosophy.


Almost as if my mention of philosophy in tandem with gaming
has become not unlike Marvel editors’ desire to inject doom
where no doom previously existed

To that point (somehow), here on ATE, self-identity is a big focus. I’m supposing one of the pivotal factors as to why is due to the inherently philosophical bent I imbue most of my writing with. Whether or not one thinks video games are worthy of such an ardent endeavor is a no-nothing-never mind to me, the proposed premise set forth is accepting from moment one that they possess the means to be philosophically imbued, and thusly proving with every passing day and each article hence forth that the notion will be ratified as true here after. There is reasonable meaning hidden in plain sight among that gibberish, I assure you, and my efforts lead me to believe there is a symbiotic relationship involving self-identity going on to help frame my axiom.

To explicate more directly to my notion of self-identity, I’m never quite sure what ATE is going to be. My current fathoming, as it were, places my distance from ATE as if some kind of metaphysical moment where I look at the thing and liken it to a child playing with a doll and wondering aloud: Is this my doll? One of those weird moments in youth that happens that acts as both a moment of simultaneous theorizing and therapy that helps to put into a frame of reference what I am, what the doll may be, and how we relate to each other. I don’t know for a fact if that’s what’s actually happening in those moments, I never claimed to be a child psychologist, that just rings true on some level. Though, much like my bemusement of that comparison, the uncertainty of what one “is” more safely resides beyond a more static mode of being, how “one” perhaps can be many things at once, never just one thing at a given moment, and never the same thing for too long on any spectrum of time. In this instance, comparing the act of writing as therapy, akin to a child talking to their doll while brushing its hair, leads me to believe the process of self-identity is indeed just that, a process, a never ending one, and why at this given moment of curiosity, I question both myself and this site thoroughly as I look at ATE and wonder: is this my doll?


The answer to this question sometimes a bit more
horrifyingly concluded than one would likely have hoped

Which kind of leads into my random purging of recent thoughts I had about gaming, which took the form of a follow up to my initial sentiments involving Mario Kart. My last write up was kind of a more abstracted distillation of analysis breaking down the essence of not just what Mario Kart “is”, so to speak, but what the conceptual nature of the launch of the Switch 2 launch title represents, using the tongue and cheek roughshod metaphoricity of virtual experience vs lived perspective, and the distance therein. It’s a bit of a queer approach, I concede, but as per the beginning of this article, I think there exists a much greater wellspring of possibility involved with gaming as a focus than just the drab confines that a console war helps to define, though finance remains the sadly domineering Sword of Damocles that swings over our sweating brows and wearied heads.


US tariffs are going to make things get a lot worse
before they return to just regular kinds of shitty

Quite the long winded and twisting way of saying Nintendo has a sacred cow, and they know how to milk it of its raw divinity. Normally the notion of milking is associated with a more negative connotation, which is not the quality I wish to impart the mention here with, as I believe it’s the poetic prose I profusely fancy, in which I reference MK’s utilization more than the absence of an abusive, metaphoric act Nintendo is putting one of it’s famously prized livestock through by any sane realistic consideration. I suppose The Big N having the wise temperance to release only a single MK on a platform every cycle shows how mindful they are in treating, arguably, one of their most important flagships with the well needed respect it deserves, lest it go the way of the creed. 


Seen here: the end of yearly fun

My enjoyment of writing about Mario Kart and Nintendos’ success through the franchise with a philosophical approach per my last article was a delight, though it left a little bit to be desired in terms of a more practical approach to what the game has to offer or where the series seems to be moving. These relevant critiques slipped through the cracks in a mixed moment of rushed sentiment, feeling both satisfied in what I had conjured on the screen, and the abhorrent lack of minutes I had left to elaborate any more thoroughly upon the many magical mysteries that await Mario Karters the world over come June 5th.  


The magic of fast food, it would turn out.
My goodness, the optics involved….

Not that the MK munchies on wheels being the equivalent of a happy meal to go was the crux of Nintendo’s extended preview, but I’m sure on some level someone involved in the incorporation of fast food as an ingame pick me up thought to themselves “boy I wish we had McDonalds numbers.” Which really, when one starts to peel away any deeper philosophical levels of meaning video games may have, one must confront the stark reality of just how much of a cheap and greasy by the numbers trashfest of a consumer industry gaming has begun to devolve into. I have no doubts many of the larger companies at play would delight at being able to concoct a product as mind-numbingly addictive as a big mac is, or why the comparative idea of the product being boiled down into something so easily scoffed down and throwaway in repeatable value when distilled into a dollar amount would get any number of CEO’s jizzing in their buster blues in a New York Minute.


What the faces of Nintendo’s
stock holders look like when they
think about what it would feel like
if the Big N could turn quarterly profits
like McDonalds did

The more fetching concept to me, not being a Nintendo stock holder mind you, is what Mario Kart World seems to be aiming for, by fashioning a structured foundation betwixt the entities of must have platformer and launch racer à la mode by combining the two worlds into one grand amalgamation of gratuity. At least, in theory, as Nintendo seems to be having their cake and eating it too with Mario Kart World, as the games charge jump mechanic seems to make the title a hybrid of sorts, as it essentially transforms the game into a racing/platforming hybrid with the versatility of traversal it allows the player to enjoy, even beyond what the now cultivated sense of free roaming geography services. Why have simply just another Mario platformer or bog standard Kart racer most would dismiss as too familiar, when you can upend both notions at the same time and make a hybridized title, very much akin to what the Switch 2 has to offer as a hybridized system. A ridiculously scrumptious offering, like combining your two favorite things.

Like eating on a roller coaster, Nintendo does translate
to “leave luck to heaven”, and I think we finally understand
why together

Though it remains to be seen, aside from the deconstruction with what constitutes “filler” and “AAA” gameplay moments involved with what a launch platformer and a must have racer would independently entail (another article entirely), we shall see what worth Mario Kart World has to offer, when Charge Jumping is finally fondled by the greasy masses at large, and exploits the hell out of the mechanic in possibly the most delicious ways imaginable. The gratification there after will matter more than any ace in the hole the charge jumping represents, though we will get a glimpse in the same moments as to what constitutes the cheap thrills of a happy meal toy and the inflated sensibilities of fine dining, what marks the satisfying difference between the two, and whether or not the sense of shame of binge eating either has a distinguished distinction of disgust that seperates them.

These feelings of repulsive contentment will help to officiate whether or not gamers want a five-course meal instead of a fast food hamburger, or whether or not it’s that they just don’t want to feel like they’re paying for a five-course meal when all they are in fact getting is a fast food hamburger.

I’m guessing it’s going to be gratuitously greasy indulgence either way.

~Pashford

Mario Kart World: At the Starting Line

Where was I?


Ah yes…Nintendo having a cow (man).

At least, doing a dressing down of Mario Kart World for the Switch 2 is of a severe interest to me, but I’m sometimes guilty of needing to warm up a bit first before I can get directly to the matter at hand. I’ve had “business down south” as of late, which is more or less my unnecessarily cryptic way in referring to an extended gaming sabbatical, as it were. Not a break away from gaming, mind you, but a break from writing about gaming, which you’d think were not entirely separated modes of being, though I take the time now to reexamine the notion as to why. I think the very essence of play is vital to the grandeur of human endeavor, and has a deep relevancy in filling this abstract void within the self, rejuvenating an individual in ways hard to describe without sounding like a completely pretentious wanker without doing so, but here we are. I think it’s important to display humility and ratify a sense of humor in any matter as much as it is worthwhile to take serious what we often don’t consider thoroughly enough, hence my address of the realities involving the different modes of play and engaging with gaming in a myriad of ways.


Some ways of engaging more compelling than others

To wit; I also think one of the difficulties of writing about games is that it changes the frame of reference of how one plays them, which is a radical notion to me when I really stop to consider the details involved in any in-depth degree. I don’t think it’s a dubious claim to suggest writers need to frame their efforts in scribing the world through some kind of pre-established narrative, at this moment now considering what an authentically “anarchist” way of writing would even look like…if such a thing were even possible. In the case of Mario Kart World, which when boiled down to its finer elements, would be considered a sports related title, it still brings forth the notion that even in competitive sports reporting, or maybe very much so in a credit to competitive sports reporting, one is always attempting to magnify or articulate a narrative when sharing the content through their own perception to the crowd at large. A purely mathematical pretense in describing the events would come off as psychotic, I would speculate, and would rob the players and their spectators of the very humanity that makes the game even function on a basic social level.


Truth is relative: there is no race without the non-racers

Which ties nicely into my trepidation in writing about Mario Kart World, even though my lack of writing about games has really only been a few weeks. For anyone who’s followed me for long enough, thats a pittance to the sometimes months and even years away from the keyboard I’ve taken in terms of just thinking, playing, and being away from the keyboard. I’ve continued to consider both a contextual narrative for gaming and writing about play itself, and discussing the metaphysical realities therein and relationally speaking to things even as silly as a cow grinding on a rail with a kart, or about the notions involved with the humanity at play in something that seems as by the numbers and basic as Mario Kart tends to be. Seeing elements within the gameplay footage of MKW, like the open world geography, brings forth the essence of Nintendo doing the complete opposite of what they pulled off with Mario Kart Tour, in that instead of distilling the MK experience into the smallest idea possible, they wanted to really open the premise up and go as broad as imaginable, continuing to borrow from the hyped zeitgiest that has permeated their brand as a knock on effect from the lingering excitements that the Breath of the Wild strategem has provided for their catalog since the calamity occurred.


Life changing, to say the least

Which may sound quite disjointed to some, referencing events hither and thither that carry referential rapport, and conjuring thematics of possible revelatory status to the subject at hand, one that within its code and most reductionist sense of self, begets the notion of humanity thriving through the essence of a bloviating bovine, and all the anthropomorphizing that goes on there after, but a kart race is more than the sum of its parts, and therefore possesses a deeper dimensionality just as much as a cow is more than simply the context of its moo, transformed by both its surroundings, its observers, its relevancy to the structure of the function of the race, the avatar of the player, the controller of a kart, and the competitor in an event. The cow becomes the conduit through which we experience the simulacrum of Nintendo’s hegemony, all of which we become apart of through the mere spectacle of commerce distilled, the witnessed and the testified all benchmarks of the race won before even the starting line was crossed.

~Pashford

Words of Wisdom: Mind to the Grind

Adversity is often key in cultivating a sense of who we truly are.


The great educator that is death…just look at how
many lessons I learned

Not to say that we don’t deserve a break every now and again, but the struggle of the everyday and how we decide to build ourselves in the face of difficulty is integral to the growth process. Whether it be something as simple as playing a video game, or something as grand as confronting our own existential value in the face of the seemingly infinite expanse of the entire universe in our waking hours, every moment is instrument in building us up into the kind of person we will become. I think that’s why it’s important to not just throw ourselves into the grind without purpose or thought relentlessly, but be mindful about how we do so. When we put our mind to the grind as well as our bodies, we can not only test ourselves in a number of ways, but we can also be mindful while we do it. I think there’s a lot of worth in the phrase work smarter not harder, and applying our experience, wisdom, and insight into how we are able to process the harsh realities of life, to better prepare for even more in the future, and the best ways to cultivate ourselves in the process, will not only temper us into improved versions of ourselves, but with mindfulness, the most ideal person we want to be will come out on the other end.

Take care of yourself, and others.

~Pashford

Behind the Games: Alien Signifiers

In a world that often defies the concepts of what constitutes normalcy, one is then tasked with the notion of approaching the everyday with a paranormal thought process.


Let’s get real spooky with it

Something I think about a lot that maybe doesn’t become more radically apparent to the readers eyes is more about the ideas behind the games themselves then just what the games “have to offer”. I’m sure I’ve stopped to consider before how others view or interpret gaming, though I find it’s always worth sharing just how deeply I’ve dug into the consideration of what those realities entail. I believe this thought has come to mind with my small article involving the Metroid Prime 4 reveal, and my approach in briefly covering “what it is” vs “what it isn’t”, or at the very least in a more paired down exposition of the matter, the information people wanted from the piece (or said trailer the piece was about, more so). I kind of alluded to some of what I’m speaking to right now with my mention of another article involving just what makes a “REAL” Zelda game, in fact a “REAL” Zelda game, and obviously, opinion’s will vary.


Worth it to mention for our younger readers, that
the trailer for Wind Waker on Gamecube, which debuted
more than twenty years ago, had initial push back from
a bunch of “hardcore” fans for not being a “REAL” Zelda game

One word I didn’t use at all in my original decontructionism involved with “The Abstract Limitations of Wisdom”, and it’s address of what entailed the “-ishness” of gaming in general was in reference to “signifiers”, which reappropriates a word from philosophy to better understand gaming through a similar lens, and helps to highlight my points in both frame of reference for how I view games, and the relative value of how others view games, among a myriad of aspects involving the “play” process. For example, with Metroid prime 4, I didn’t feel the need to focus on any lore indicators and or implications about the MP4 trailer, even the name of the planet, let alone the fact that Samus got “psychic abilities” to operate mechanisms within the games context. Some of this does boil down to priorities, as others may be more invested in the world of Metroid more than me, but the relative “signifiers” for what was present seemed on brand with MP4, which was the priority implicit with the presence of the “signifiers”, more so in the general vibe of what people would come to expect within the series defaults, more or less.

More to a specific mention, moments involving a new ability are relevant, yes, like Samus’ new “psychic abilities”. Though relevant, these abilities do represent just another “signifier” so to speak, and brings to light the idea of properties possessing propositions, that familiar which belongs to them, these elements they guarantee as “signifiers” and that one can effectively blend or utilize appropriately. Whether the utilization is through fantasy, sci-fi, or a hybridization process thereafter, the “signifiers” embody the rationalization of the entity, and thusly dictated and vindicated through the property possession proposition of said entity to predicated the “signifier”. One quick example that springs to me in reminding me of some of the “high” tech stuff that might pass off as a hybridization process thereafter (I.E. MAGIC) for such in the gaming realm is Metal Gear Solid, which more or less kind of comes off as purely magical in some respect, but still as a series, has a very strong identity, with effective “signifiers” for what gives Metal Gear Solid it’s “-ishness”, so to speak.


Pictured: “the unseen”, aka, nanomachines, son

With all that in focus, but shifting perspective a little bit, I think reassessing the priorities of the collective represents a good relative observation as well, as gaming possesses several interpretations, depending on who you speak to. I think, in maybe the most reductionist of approaches, reducing gaming to a consumer product…which it is, if we take away the magic of marketing and the beautifully blinding effects of nostalgia for just a moment, then we beging to see the justification process involving the relatively straight forward yet bizarrely abstract evaluation methodology of what the game worthy or unworthy, as it were


A set of signifiers, as it were, which sometimes entails
Captain’s America’s buttcheeks

Within an even greater narrowing of this perspective, or to help dismistify the trascendence process of worth to a zero sum total, Nintendo is essentially selling the player on this new game with signifiers, and in that context, you have to look at Samus’s new suit, the new abilities, and even in more obtuse ways, see “the unseeable”, to deduce whether or not both what you have been shown and from a marketing standpoint of excitement, what has not been shown, in order to justify to yourself whether or not these new signifiers represent a successful rationalization process to spend sixty dollars. I think to many, that would almost be a spoiled deconstructionism of what has occurred, with so many excitable hobbyists defending brand names or delusional fanboys already sold on the name Metroid Prime through a process of self-identifying through brand name and consumer product alone, the unseen of the trailer is the blind loyalism that follows a branding of signifiers that concludes an already spent sixty dollars, outside of further context.


Basically what anyone thinks when they start reading any philosophy

I had a lot more to say, which would have continued to dive into the notions of the metaphysical realities that follow suit in the observance of the nature of gaming and how those abstractions further and perhaps even more importantly cement the notion of valuable signifiers within the realm of gaming and the unseen, as it were, but we’ll have to leave it there for now. I am left with the notion that I have long agreed, as an aside, with the old observance that gaming is a business that art sometimes escapes through, though that’s another conversation upon itself as well, and yet one more point of interest that will also have to wait patiently in the wings until it’s more timely debut is to be center stage within the theatrics of the gaming world.

~Pashford

Playing For Shits And Giggles

When the world is falling apart, be sure to have a comfortable front row seat.


How I look checking the headlines for what frightening nightmares the new day brings

Another short one from me today my riztastic readers, as per my quickie yesterday, at some point in my week, I do have to both get some well deserved rest *and* find time to you know, actually play the games I wish to write about. Mar10 Day shennigans definitely derailed me a bit, but it’s good to catch up with Nintendo’s sacred cow once in a blue moon. I use to make it a habit to do a one shot playthrough of any major Mario game upon it’s release day, and just do one massive 12 hour session to 100% the whole thing in it’s entirety to help manufacture the greatest amount of challenge and really highten the dopamine rush of some gaming par excellence. A reality I sadly was not able to predicate upon with Mario Wonder on day of launch, but playing through the game in a similar manner is still in the cards.


Super Mario Wonder definitely the elephant in
the room of my potential Mar10 Day festivities

Speaking of cards…that segways perfectly into a game I did finally get to sit down with briefly and try out after reading so much bluster involving it’s highly addictive nature, and that’s Balatro, which has been regularly praised by outlets far and wide as the new hotness, being a highly addictive card game you will simply not be able to put down. Well, after putting the title down after about twenty minutes of playtime, I can tell you emphatically that is simply not true.

Admittedly, it would seem I merely dipped my toe into the perverbial waters of interest, and plan on continuing to play it to see just “what is up” with the game, but thus far, it is seemingly just some suped up remix of Poker with more of a collection aspect to it involving combo cards with special abilities. Not sure if there is some crazy grand twist to the game along the lines of Doki Doki Literature Club where the game does a 180, ditches the faux premise it sets itself up to appear to be, but then diverts right into crazy town by being super meta while simultaneously possessing a twisted narrative hidden behind an unassuming aesthetic….or if Balatro really is just, you know, kind of like poker.


Pictured: Balatro’s main gameplay hook

The jokers are wild, it would seem.

~Pashford