Caraig's Journal

Jon, the Local Man of Some Curiosity But Not Quite Mystery, here at lovely Newark Liberty Int'l Airport with a DidjaKnow?(tm) moment.

DidjaKnow?(tm)...

o that United has replaced a good percentage of their ticketing counter people with ATM-style machines? (No bonus points for guessing if Diebold made 'em.)
o that United now charges for in-flight meals?
o that the airport has flights at all hours, but if you want a cup of java or even just plain bottled water and a stale croissant, you need to wait until about 5:30AM?
o that United now charges you for the priviledge of the 5 extra inches that sitting in a seat next to an emergency exit gives?
o that there is something called a "CerealBar" in the terminal? No joke, they sell cereal and milk. Probably bowls and spoons, too, I hope. The Tick was unavailable for comment.

DidkaKnow?(tm) is a trademark of Adam Warren. Maybe. He came up with it first, at any rate.

This post marks the first use of the DOGSNAKE! pic, for things that are just plain whackado beyond mortal ken.

SNOW!

So nine months after I move here, I discover that I do seem to indeed be missing boxes and Stuff from the move. At least one box of books, which had large-format art books in it and all my LARP books in it but for one, most of which one probably can't find anymore. This is mildly frustrating and irritating, since I know that these books were either repacked or brought with me. Most likely repacked.

Then again, the garage is such a mess right now and my stuff scattered all over that I'd be hard-pressed to tell you exactly where things are. They might still be there, somewhere, but until I get my own place and unpack, Heavens know where the books I'm missing might be.

Pax

So, thought I would distract myself and give you some good old fashioned shorty game reviews. There aren't many spoilers here, I think.

First up, Portal. This is probably one of the most enjoyable first-person games I've played in a while. No combat (well, not really), no guns whipped here and there, just good old fashioned puzzle solving. And one of the most fun and best-written mad computers I've ever seen. Plus, the gun turrets are absolutely adorable. Yes, the turrets are. They have this sweet little innocent voice even when they're trying to kill you.

Next, F.E.A.R. - Extraction Point. A sequel/expansion pack to F.E.A.R. from about a year ago, Extraction Point is you getting out of the mess left behind in the first game. It still has creepy twitchy moments, but it's actually much better than the first. Plus, it has a really very nice climax, if a bit cryptic. It's unfortunately very linear.

Then, in contrast, we have Clive Barker's Jericho. Where F.E.A.R. is terror, Jericho is horror, and it makes no bones about it. There's a lot of blood and gore, there's pretty horrific creatures and beasts. At the same time, it's not scary, so I can play it at night. It also has an intriguing storyline, based off of oddball interpretations of Gnostic and Kabbalistic beliefs. (So yeah, it caught my attention.) Still, this is an extremely mature game in that there's a lot of cussing, a lot of crappy humor, and a lot of blood and gore. But that's Clive Barker for you. It reminds me a bit of Prey. It is extremely linear, though, which is a downside.

Half Life 2: Episode 2. Continued excellent writing, characters with depth, and an intriguing storyline, it nevertheless left me kind of cold. It was more of the same. Maybe Episode 3 will be different -- at least, it should be, considering what's happening in it. The Source engine, while excellent, is starting to show some signs of age, though.

So, what games have you been playing lately?

You know, I have no idea where this image is from. All I know is that I stumbled onto it last night and it just spoke to me of sheer awesome.

I mean, srsly. Wearing gold lame while skyboarding on an alligator and apparently dodging anti-aircraft fire. Awesome.

Ganked from

Okay, remember the review I made of Shoot 'Em Up? Just saw Hot Fuzz. It's distinctly British (same guys who did Shaun of the Dead) and it's almost as over-the-top, with none of the creepiness that SEM gave me. It was just fall-down hilarious.

More later. Pax.

Okay, folks. I am taking this opportunity to improve things in my life. One of the things is, because of the insane gas milage and my TIE Jeep ("Zot") is getting rather venerable, is to get a Toyota Prius.

I am now soliciting names for this vehicle. The current contenders are 'ZAPP' (goes well with 'ZOT' and it IS electric after all!) and 'BEWM' (using the Nevada Atomic Test Site Museum plate, of course.)

Are there any good resources out there for the design of
role-playing games? Mostly I'm looking for mechanics stuff like designing conflict resolution systems and such. This is for pen-and-paper RPGs. Thanks in advance!

I highly recommend going to the website of Rick Loomis. This is a photographer who hasn't gotten nearly enough recognition.

His pictures of Burning Man are incredible. He has some amazing shots in there!

However, I would also like to direct people to one set of photos that have not been shown to the US public. Go to the 'Menu' and click on 'Projects' then 'New Battle.' These pictures might disturb you, so please do not click if you're not up for it. Yes, it's related to the war; but it's not photography from within the war zone, though Loomis is also a good war photographer. Basically, what I'm saying is, if you support the war and/or the President, you owe it to yourself to check out his 'New Battle' photoessay and think. That's all.

Beyond that, he's got a lot of amazing photos in there which, no matter what your political orientation, are simply fantastic.