The Inevitable New Year's Post

So here it is, New Year's Eve, and once again, for the fourth straight year in a row, I am NOT writing out a hateful, spite-filled mass e-mail that insults all my friends and indulges in my once a year explosion of venom and envy over the fact that they are happy and I am not.

Having been with the Wife now for four years (although this was the first as a married couple) I can safely say that the jealousy I experienced over the happiness my friends had being with someone is long dead and gone.

So this is about something else entirely. I already got a chance to write the GameAxis editorial page, the first and last time I will likely to do that, and it's simply because it was my chance to say goodbye to magazine and its readers in my capacity as the main staff writer. But one of the things that I mentioned in the editorial is that this particular New Years that is being rung in (at least, in this time zone, obviously Canada has yet to experience it) is that I'm very much living the typical cliche for this time of year; that being out with the old and in with the new.

2006 is my last year in Singapore. After just over 10 years, the island that I more or less landed on by whim and accident is finally being left behind with one Wife, two cats, many, many books, comics, CDs, DVDs, games and one plastic guitar. 2007 becomes my first year in Canada after all this time. It kind of floors me to think that I have never, ever set foot in my own home country since the new millennium dawned on us. When I left, the internet barely existed, DVDs didn't at all and there was no such thing as an online transaction or free communication via online cams, headsets or instant messaging systems. Blogs didn't exist. iPod didn't exist and people still had carry around either a portable CD or tape player if they wanted to listen to their music collections. Global Positioning Systems weren't available to the mass market and Starbucks, Wal-Mart and other big American conglomerates had yet to set foot on Canadian turf (at least, in Edmonton, where I lived).

Now, in this new year, not only do I have a different part of the country, a different city to adjust to, but a different kind of lifestyle entirely. I left Canada as a university graduate and come back to it as a writer who's done just about everything you can with the English language for money. I come back to a country far more technologically advanced than it was when I left it, and I come back with some pets and, most importantly, a Wife.

So while the New Year is certainly filled with a lot of unknowns, there's a lot of excitement and promise, even in the midst of the uncertainty. And, as schlocky and disgusting as it sounds, I'm not at all scared or massively worried about what the future will hold, because after being away from Canada for so long, and being in a country where free speech, other political parties or even pornography simply don't exist... I have a lot more appreciation for what Canada has to offer. Especially to people in the creative industries. In Canada, you don't have to worry that what you say will get you arrested, you only have to worry about whether it's good or not. Trust me, that doesn't seem like a big thing, but after having had to butt heads with the Singapore government in one form or another over the last couple of years, believe me, it really DOES color your point of view about what to say or not say when you know that you may pay for it in a very Official Capacity. It will be nice to know in Canada when you say something that is true, no one in the government can arrest, fine, or otherwise harrass you for it.

The other thing of course is the Wife. We have a good thing going and I really, truly love her a lot. Tons even. And everything seems bearable or even conquerable as long she's around. And no matter whether things get very good, or very bad, or merely very complicated, all of these things are easier to live through with her beside me. And more fun too. And I'm looking foward to seeing what happens with her when we get to Toronto. For me, it is a home coming, and even though Toronto is unfamiliar, Canada with its cold, its creativity and its very, very unAmerican sanity and compassion, is not. Everything will be new to her, and I'm interested in seeing what Canada will be like through her eyes as she experiences so many firsts, like, unfortunately, snow and sub-zero temperatures.

Of course it won't be easy, but then is any kind of positive change ever a walk in the park? There will be new things to get used to, she will have to adjust to being a very busy artist, and I still have a few projects that are brewing which I can't yet talk about, but hopefully those will keep me very, very busy in 2007. And also extremely happy and geeky. So I dunno whether 2007 is going to be a better year than 2006, but it certainly is going to be a LOT different. And perhaps more fun.

So that's it. My final New Year's Eve in a place where you can actually break into an unpleasant sweat while standing around outside during the countdown because of the stifling heat and humidity.

And as for those of you not in Singapore, well, Happy New Year in advance. This'll be the last time I beat you to it...

Labels: Icky Couple Stuff, Musing, My Life

Again With The Shitty Kitty

Except in this case it was one of those rare occasions when I actually remember my dreams. In this case, a dream about the fact that one of our cats, Uno, had a thick pile of crap seemingly attached to her bottom like a skirt, and where ever she ran so too did this digusting fashion accessory.

The Wife also had similarly themed dream, but hers involved a gigantic piece of shit lying at the bottom of a drained canal.

I guess it's a good sign of how close you are when you start sharing the same themes in your dreams, but man, couldn't it have been something less... fecal?

Labels: Rare Dreams

Still. Not. Legal.

Okay, so it looks like my Employment Pass has NOT been approved after all. This is a bit annoying. After getting the letter saying the EP was approved, I headed on down to my all time favorite place in the world, the Ministry of Manpower, aka, MOM, to once again get some of that sweet, sweet tender loving care that only MOM can provide. As usual, the bureaucracy threw a spanner in the works.

After asking me to produce some documents saying that I had what was called a Banker's Guarantee, which more or less means that a certain amount of money has been set aside in a bank account of sorts and will sit there for the duration of my employment. On the off chance that I do something criminal or inexplicably vanish, the money goes to the government. I provided the document and they looked at it and promptly said, "We're not giving you your EP."

The reason is, apparently, that the guarantee expires on March 31st. This, I thought, was not a problem, because it also gets renewed on April 3rd, but according to them, that three day gap might allow me to do all kinds of untold havoc on the island for which I would not be covered.

Of course, this is all kind of pointless since I'm leaving on January 11th, and we'd simply renewed the EP--or tried to--a few months back, so I wouldn't have to keep going in to get my passport stamped over and over again, something that has happened ANYWAY, thanks to the wonderful bureaucracy of MOM. However, there is hope.

All I have to do is quit.

Once I say "Okay, I'm unemployed," they'll stamp my passport for two weeks and expect me to be out of the country by then. Since I am now only going to be here for... oh, two more or weeks or less, it looks like this will suit me just fine.

I hate how complicated, slow and contradictary this simple, fast and intuitive system of theirs is. Someone is seriously racking up some bad karma for having successfully marketed that to the public...

Labels: Singapore Stupidity

Getting Stuff Back

Now that the move is something like two weeks away, people are slowly either receiving things from us that we are trying to get rid of, or giving things back we had borrowed. Case in point, Battlestar Galactica DVDs. I first saw the new BSG when a friend over here loaned me his Australian version of the mini-series. I held onto it waaaaay longer than I should have, even after getting the season 1 and 2 collections for myself, so I returned that today. I also got back my season 1 collection from someone who'd borrowed it for a few months, and then loaned to the same person season 2 so that he could try and watch it over the weekend and return it to me by Monday.

Also, even though it took far longer than it should have, I have been contacted by the Ministry of Manpower and told that my Employment Pass has been approved and I can once again get a green card to remain legal in Singapore. Unfortunately, of course, this means that as soon as I get said Employment Pass, I'll have to turn right around and cancel it. I was kind'a hoping that they would have given it to me a couple months earlier when I actually tried to renew it, but bureaucracy being what it is, they are now issuing it to me only now. It's unfortunate, because the temporary visa they stamped me with in the meantime actually expires on January 9th. If they'd just stamped it for two more days, I wouldn't need to get the Employment Pass and could have told them to just cancel it right there. However, bureaucracy being what it is, there are rules and this is one I'll just have to laboriously navigate through. Fun, fun, fun...

Labels: Battlestar Galactica, My Life, Singapore Stupidity

We Interrupt Your Daily Blog

Because, well... an earthquake has ripped through Taiwan and thus knocked out the main fiberoptic cable that made it possible for people in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore to surf North American sights within a sane period of time.

So yes, Internet access is extremely limited for those of us still stuck on the other side of the Pacific ocean, which, at the moment, I still am.

Labels: My Life

Nowhere Is Still Going Somewhere

Just veeeeeeery sloooooowly. The sketchy artwork to the left (clickable as usual for enlargement) is a rendering of Fen, one of the main characters of the story. Yes, he is an Elf with a katana. No I am not going to explain why, not here. There's a fairly lengthy story behind that, and it will have to wait for the comic to be told.

Speaking of which, yes, the comic. It is still sitting on a pile over at Slave Labor Graphics, a smaller, indie style publisher, and we have been told that the Chief Guy Who Picks Comics, Dan Vado, has indeed seen the submission sitting on said pile. He just hasn't looked at it yet. Having had much experience with the speed with which book publishers work, this comes to me as no surprise whatsoever. When you actually have a buzillion other things to do--like making sure your existing titles come out on time, for example--finding some time to look at new stuff and consider it can take a while. Still, at least that's not a "no."

At least not yet. Oh well back to tweaking some scripts...

Labels: Artwork, Creating Comics, Nowhere, Writing

The New Digs

The Wife, for whatever reason, got it into her head to make my blog more "proper," as in something that looked like it was owned and about a genuine, interesting human being. As opposed to a giant geek. This is the end result. It is quite snazzy looking, I think, in a subversive, 60's, self-help book sort of way until you actually start taking a closer look and realize that things may be slightly... off. Anyway, I'm quite pleased with it, although there are still a few kinks that need to be worked out, and doubtless some typos that need to be fixed. But in the event that novels should get published, comics should get approved, or other projects should get the green light... This new website will be here to proclaim to newcomers, "Please buy into the idea that I do not suck."

And also, because I am completely stupid, I have gone to the trouble of actually manually tagging every single entry for easier searching and categorization. Yes. All 700+ of them. I am that boring, stubborn and stupid.

Whoo hoo for makeovers!

Labels: Neat-O Gadgetry

The Most Pathetic Christmas Eve Of All

Spent with the Wife, talking, eating pizza, being happy together, discussing future projects online, possibly watching bad, BAD movies (or dinosaurs), and doing Super-Uber-Nerd-Geek-Loser things like working on websites, writing TV scripts or, most losery of all, reorganizing a blog thanks to the new tag functions that Blogger has recently upgraded to.

Merry Christmas to all. Yes, I know we suck. We've made peace with that.

Labels: Icky Couple Stuff, My Life

Game Tunes! Japanese Girls! Super Cute Violin Go Go Go!

The girl on the left, believe it or not, is an enormously talented violinist by the name of Ayako Ishikawa. But tonight all that dozens of heavy set geeks thought as they drooled over her was "Gee... I wish that super cute violinist was my girlfriend because I love all things Japanese, which she most definitely is!"

Recently I wrote an article for GameAxis that briefly covered the history of video game music and included a bit about a group that was coming down to Singapore from Australia. They're called Eminence, and they're a bunch of classically trained musicians who got fed up with traditional orchestral music being considered "real music" and game music being considered... not music. Super Cute Ayako was one of the more recent additions to the troupe. As a result of me writing said article, I managed to score some tickets for The Wife and I, since the organizers seemed extremely happy that someone actually wrote an article with a fair amount of confidence and knowledge of the field, and I even got a thank you on the back of the program along with the GameAxis editors.

It was a freakish experience, but very, very cool. The first thing that immediately struck me as bizzare was the fact that there wasn't a musician on the stage over the age of 35. And the same went for the 98% of the audience. Of course, the other freaky thing was when they started to perform. This wasn't a full orchestra, it was an ensemble of two violinists, a pianist, a drummer and guitarist, along with Yasunori Mitsuda, a notable Japanese game composer who played on a very old looking Greek, mandolin-ish type instrument.

As soon as they songs started up, it was very strange for me. I think this is the first time I've kind of been "touched" in a way during a concert. I've been to plenty of concerts with some incredibly talented musicians and the music has always been soaring and amazing and inspiring. But this is the first time I've heard the music and thought to myself "I know that... I grew up with that music as a kid..." and it went to some other part of my brain that traditional classical music doesn't go and gave me a shiver. As stupid as it sounds, just hearing the themes of Chrono Cross or Xenosaga being played out immediately set off images in my head of those games, those moments and I got genuine chills from the recognition. Also, according to The Wife's theory, the fact that two immensely talented violinists didn't help matters, because she believes that the sound of a live violin being played goes directly to the "Emo Lobe" of the brain and pretty much makes you want to cry whether you want to or not. Something about the particular frequency it resonates at.

All I know for sure is that the performance was a LOT of fun. I hope in Toronto the Play! Video Game Symphony Orchestra will show up again (they already played there in September) and bring the full sonic assault of stuff like Final Fantasy and Halo out in force. 'Cause I have to admit, it was very cool but very bizarre to be hearing classical music, get really excited about it, and then afterwards get the kind of applause and hooting and hollering normally associated with a rock concert. Positively surreal, man. But fun!

Labels: Culture, Games, Music, My Life

When It's Not Yours

This is something that has been weighing in with less-than- heavy, but slightly-more-than-medium impact on my thoughts of late. The reason will probably be abudantly clear in a few months (ah, hindsight, how obvious you are), but for now, let's just play in generalities.

I'm talking about Fan Fiction. That is, when a writer or aspiring writer runs into the already established playground of another person's story/world/characters and starts mucking around with it, creating stories of their own based on that other person's creation. Neil-O was actually asked about the issue of fan fiction a few years back, and the fan wanted to know what Neil-O himself thought of fan fiction. Neil-O's response, somewhat abbreviated was this:

Er, no, I don't read fanfiction.

I think that all writing is useful for honing writing skills. I think you get better as a writer by writing, and whether that means that you're writing a singularly deep and moving novel about the pain or pleasure of modern existence or you're writing Smeagol-Gollum slash you're still putting one damn word after another and learning as a writer.

But I do think that, in the final analysis, all a writer really has to give is the stuff that only she or he can give the world and no-one else can. That the sooner you sound like you and tell the stories only you can tell, for good or for ill, the better. And from that point of view, I suppose I think of fan-fiction as training wheels. Sooner or later you have to take them off the bike and start wobbling down the street on your own.

This strikes me as a fairly sensible approach to writing. Others, it would seem, took major offense to this, as Neil-O himself found out the very next day. He lists the varied and angry reactions to his statements:

Having said that, it also looked like a lot of the people telling me off hadn't even read the whole post, or had just seen other people on other sites quoting the last paragraph, which was then extensively quoted back at me as evidence that: I don't know what I'm talking about; do not understand that people are writing fan-fiction for pleasure, or that fan-fiction is a valid artistic purpose in itself; that I am myself nothing more than a glorified fan writer; that people writing movies and TV shows and comics and books are really writing fan-fiction; that real life is really fan-fiction; that all comics writers are writing fan fiction and what about that time I wrote (insert comics/historical/mythical characters I didn't create here)?; that Shakespeare was writing fan fiction; and that my choice to write fiction that I do not call fan-fiction should not be seen in any way as a reflection on those who wear their fan-fiction proudly. Also if I'd just read some decent Buffy/Smallville/Legolas/Gone With the Wind fan-fiction I wouldn't have been so rude about those who choose to write it.

This whole notion of fan fiction, and what it is, isn't and its merits is something I've been mulling over in odd moments. I suppose in the strictest sense, one could say that fan fiction is the creation of one person that is interpreted by another. Although the angry critics of Neil-O above were taking it to a fairly furious extreme, on some level, one could make the argument that unless the original creator is doing it, anything else is fan fiction. This isn't always the case however. If you want to go the legal/corporate route, then fan fiction is anything that isn't officially "endorsed" in some capacity by the creator or the corporate/legal entity that holds rights to a particular intellectual property.

This is the more practical, every day definition that people are used to, and that is why even though a new writer will come on board for the Batman comic, the Dune series of novels or the latest James Bond film, these new works are still considered "canon" even though the original creators had no hand in it. They also have the benefit of some kind of professional transaction, ie, someone got paid to write this, as opposed to the amateur sphere in which no money (and therefore no litigation consequences) are involved.

And it's this particular kind of "official" fan fiction that I've been musing about. I find myself wondering what other writers have done when they find themselves in the position of being able to officially write for a world or character that is not their own and how they handle it. How, for example, did Ron Moore take to Star Trek: The Next Generation when he came onboard the series years after the series had already been established by others before him? Particularly when there was an expectation that a strict adherence to continuity be maintained since the show was still in production, as opposed to the major revision he did when he took Battlestar Galactica by the reins. What do you do when you know that you can't simply walk into an established "house" and start tearing out wallpaper, trashing furniture and changing it from its previous shiny art deco look to a more spare zen minimalist scheme that is more to your liking?

In the corporate world, there's pretty much an unspoken rule that when new management comes in s/he will, like a new alpha male in the pack, start trying to obliterate all traces of the previous management's influence in an effort to stamp their personal sense of individuality on the office. This, obviously, is completely unacceptable for someone coming into a franchise, although many have failed to see this fact. That's why you get bizarre anomalies such as the almost complete disregard for the spirit of the original Highlander movie in its sequel, or the abrupt and random new setting and agenda for the Buck Rogers TV series in its second season.

I grant that it is inevitable for a new creator to be unable to completely emulate the tone, manner and style of an original creator when the time comes to tackle an existing series/character. In some cases, the fresh perspective is even extremely welcome, such as the paradigm-altering take of Batman that Frank Miller tackled in The Dark Knight Returns.

So I guess in my meandering sort of way, the conclusion that I am slowly trying to come to is that if you ever find yourself in the position where someone offers you a chance to work on a character or world that is not yours, and this is a property that you have a genuine affection for, the only things you can really do are these:

1) Respect the material.

2) Try to understand what it is about the original that made you a fan in the first place.

3) Understand that your own personal voice, sensibilities and peculiarities will arise when you create the work and that this, like puberty, is completey natural, with nothing to be ashamed of, and perhaps some good may come of this fresh infusion.

4) Stay true to the spirit of the work if not the exact style.

5) Inhale the material. If it's a large body of work, take in everything. If there are appendices, supplementary materials, and other works, take the time to read and understand them. The more you know about this world you are about to step into, the better.

6) Remember that this is not yours. Remember not to try to make it yours by trying to possessively or antagonistically "clean house" so you can urinate all over the walls and claim it as your territory.

7) Conversely, do not be afraid to tread new ground. If you are religiously sticking to only what has come before, and you are contributing nothing new, you are likely not even telling a new story and are merely repeating the same stories that drew you in to begin with. While you can make an argument for people wanting only the same "feeling" with a world/character over and over again, that doesn't necessarily mean slavishly repeating the same story with a few changes in locale and names.

8) You are not (insert name of original creator here). Don't try to be. You may think you are as good as the original creator. You might even be right. But you are still NOT that person, and if you try to advertise yourself as The Second Coming of said creator, you'll just be pissing off everyone, including the fans and the creator if s/he is still alive.

9) Have fun with it. Because if it feels like work writing it, it will feel like work reading it, and that's not a winning formula to suck the audience in.

10) Pray you don't screw up.

Some day, this post is going to come back and bite me in the ass. I know it.

Labels: Creating Comics, Novel Writing, Writing

Goofing Off

Guitar Hero 2, Second Life, the movie Dodgeball and some Walking With Dinosaurs goodness. Pretty much in that order. Oh and there was a script I should have been working on today, but I'll leave that for tomorrow.

Labels: Boring And Insipid Posts, Games, Movies

Wendy Is No Longer Good And Is Very, Very Naughty.

The wife has gone and done it again. For reference, here's the old, traditional version of Wendy, the good little witch, friend of Casper:

























And now here's new Wendy, as done by The Wife. Which is the tastier cola?

























I vote new. Once again, you can click on it for a larger view.

Labels: Artwork

"WE'RE NOT WRONG... wait, we are? Oh... then.... YOU'RE STUPID!"

What an odd morning.

After arriving at the GameAxis office, I was told that a story I'd posted on the GameAxis blog had been pulled by the editorial team at the request of Singapore Press Holdings. For those of you that don't live in Singapore, SPH is company that runs the local newspaper. It is also owned by the government, in the same way that SingTel, the local phone company is also owned by the government, and the Television Corporation of Singapore is also owned by the government, in addition to Radio Corporation of Singapore which is... you guessed it, owned and operated by the government. Recently SPH actually bought out the company that publishes GameAxis.

The reason I mention all this is because last week, in the blog post which is no longer there, I wrote a story about how the local newspaper ran two articles in the same paper. One story in their technology section called Digital Life, called the Playstation 3 the must have Christmas gift of the year and urged people to buy it. The other story, in the "Home" section of the newspaper, claimed that the PS3 violated voltage standards for Singapore and so any retailer that was caught selling the console would be fined by the government.

Yes, you read that right. The newspaper told people to buy the console, but told retailers not to sell it. In an amazing second round of even greater confusion, the two articles were written by the same person.

At this point you might be thinking "That's incredibly stupid," and if you thought so, you'd be thinking exactly the same thing that I was thinking, which is why I wrote the story pointing out this amazing contradiction. I also pointed out that said contradiction was based on a factual error, because the Playstation 3 comes built-in with a universal voltage convertor and can thus safely operate anywhere in the world without bursting into flame, unless Singapore is operating on some unique Cold Fusion generator that I'm not aware of that requires a canister of hydrogen be present and attached to all consumer electronics.

So I--and the rest of the GameAxis team--were a bit cheesed when we were told that the story had to be pulled now our new "owners" had heard about it and weren't entirely happy with the criticism. They also said that they wanted an e-mail out of me explaining why I would tell such a hideous story.

Unfortunately for them, I don't think they have much knowledge of the game industry or how things work around here. Most of the points of contention they wanted explained were wholly on my side. For example, one of the points I mentioned in my article was that since journalist had written a glowing article reccomending the PS3, it must have been one of the "illegal" consoles. SPH didn't take kindly to this and insisted that the console they used for review was completely legitimate as they had received it from Sony itself.

Sadly, what they weren't aware of was that Sony gave them PS3 models from the Taiwan/Hong Kong region, which, according to their definition, made the consoles illegal. They had, in fact, just admitted to using contraband technology as they had quite precisely defined it in their article.

Suffice to say after the e-mail was written and a few other people made some relevant points to it, it was sent off and the basic message was "You're getting mad at us for telling the truth." After it was sent, we didn't hear another word from them again.

I suppose we could lie and say that the PS3 doesn't have a universal voltage convertor, but then Singapore would be the only country in the world that believes this, and I think the country is more interested in not looking ignorant than it is about having one magazine apologize for pointing out they were wrong.

Still, I can guess I can add them to my list of People Gunning For Me. Just a couple of months ago I annoyed the Media Development Authority (owned and operated by the government) and now it's the press. Man, I just can't play nice anywhere...

Labels: Journalism, Singapore Stupidity

Now Steroid Free

The Wife has gone and done her rendition of famous Streetfigher II combatant Chun Li, otherwise known as Thunder Thighs, with legs traditionally rendered in such a way that they look like the prototype for car compactors. This version still has super long legs, she just doesn't look like the vibrations from her merest thigh-muscle twitch could cause hurricans to spontaneously rip through Hawaii and ruin that year's coconut harvest. As usual, you can click on it for a more detailed version. I have already started compiling a list of other characters to throw at the Wife's Slut-O-Matic machione. Chun Li wasn't actually one of them, she did this herself out of sheer disgust, but hopefully future characters will get similar treatment.

Labels: Artwork

No End In Sight

It was with a certain amount of relief that as I was listening to Ron Moore's commentary on Battlestar Galactica season 2.5, he admitted that for the most part, it's quite normal for him (and for many TV shows in fact) to NOT know how the season (let alone the series in its entirety) is going end until over halfway through the actual season. This was intensely reassuring to me, because not only did it remind me that creative types are human beings, it also reminded me that even as human beings, they are not the most far-sighted or plan-ahead types.

Of course not all writers are like this. When it comes to giving me a major inferiority complex, JK Rowling of Harry Potter fame has supposedly mapped out the entire arc of the Harry Potter series since the very beginning. But the one who really makes me bow my head in shame is Neil-O himself. The fact that The Sandman ended the way it did and that when you go back, you can see the various mechanisms that would propel Morpheus forward towards that conclusion is an astounding piece of writing. Ron Moore makes me feel slightly better about myself when he does stuff like admit that for the emotionally satisfying end of Star Trek: The Next Generation, entitled "All Good Things," they didn't actually have the conclusion to this 7 year old series until about a month before shooting of the series finale was due.

Personally, I like to think that I write in a way similar to Neil-O, though without his obvious experience and or natural instincts at play at the same level. What Neil-O does makes a lot of sense and seems a lot more fun to me; have some kind of conclusion in mind, but leave everything leading up to it up for grabs.

While I'm still not sure that he actually followed this with relation to the conclusion of The Sandman (unless he simply looked back on it afterwards and THEN started building up to his ending) it seems like a very spontaneous and interesting way to write. And it's something that I've pretty much employed in my last three books. I always had a vague idea of how it was going to end (ie, this person dies, or that thing gets destroyed, or this crisis occurs) but I never knew what the events were that led up to this conclusion.

And for me, that's where all the FUN is. If I have my point "A" and my point "Z", I know which direction I'm going in, but all those letters in between are spontaneous adventures, and somehow knowing that I'm free to do what I want, provided that it leads to Destination Z gives my brain ample opportunity to play. Suddenly characters, situations, emotions and crises that might never have occurred to me if I were meticulously planning (or simply writing with no clear direction in mind) can spontaneously combust in my brain on any given day as I try to get to the end. Perhaps it's not the most organized way to work, but it sure is fun for me.

So in the event that my books finally do get to see print and people ever ask me, "Did you know how it was going to end?" I can honestly answer "Yes, I did. I just didn't know how I was going to get there."

Labels: Battlestar Galactica, Books, Creating Comics, Novel Writing, Writing

The Emo Post

I figured I'd do something a little different today and write something that reaches out to the kids and appeals to them on a level they can understand; ie, narcissistic and pretentious. So in an effort to appeal to this next generation of Goth, here's something for you from the depths of an imagined MySpace hell:

WAAAAAAAAAAAH! NOOOOO ONE UNDERSTAAAAAAAAAAANDS MEEEEEE!!!!

Oh online friends out there in the great, digital void... you feel my pain, you know my pain, you ARE my pain... I could just cry thinking about the dark shreds of agony that tear my heart into fragments of crying misery one jagged breath at a time. In fact, I think I WILL cry.

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!! WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!

I feel better.

Today was a horrible day. Just like yesterday. And last week. And last month. And last year, except for that one part where I finally sold my Playstation 2 for an original Nintendo Entertainment System with Duck Hunt, but other than that... anyway, today SUCKED. It was like this relentless fist that squeezed my soul until there was nothing left by bits of goo, like a spent tube of toothpaste, trust me it was AWFUL. I'm devastated. I'm destroyed. I'm nothing now and my pain has bottomless depths to it that can't be comprehended by the world at large because it simply doesn't have the room for this kind of Pain That Annihilates All.

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Anyway... The pain that so consumes me is the fact that I've lost all the pictures I took of myself. How can I express my inviduality and quirky sense of self if I don't have a picture showing the same haircut as 1 million other kids have, with my arm extended as I photograph myself in with the same moody expression and pose as those other millions of Emo kids? How am I supposed to be unique if I can't add my standard issue look to the already growing pile?

I was so upset about this that I couldn't even cut my wrists properly, it was terrible. Then some stupid African kid came running up to me screaming about how I shouldn't hurt myself! Like, HELLO?! How you can you possibly understand my pain, you little refugee?! I mean, oh, boo hoo, you barely escaped with your life from a tribal war in Mogadishu and you watched your parents gunned down before your eyes and nearly died and starved to death in a miracle escape from your hellish environment, but you don't understand what REAL PAIN is! Real pain is when you try to talk to the popular kids and they... they... IGNORE YOU...

WAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

And then to top it all off, I got told off by my older sister, who used to be a Goth. Goth is kind of like Emo, but extremely lame, because they're into all this depressing stuff like philosophy and art, and I lost all respect for Goths when I found that not only do they talk suicidal, they actually sometimes go and DO it. I mean, hello? YOU'RE ONLY SUPPOSED TO TALK ABOUT SUICIDE BECAUSE IT'S FUN AND COOL, NOT DO IT, MORON...

And I mean, they cut themselves wrong and everything! Once, my sister cut her arm lengthwise and opened up a major artery. Everyone knows you're supposed to cut across, so you get lots and lots of attention that way and post the photos on MySpace, how LAME... I mean, what kind of idiot talks about how much they want to die and then... dies?! Only losers actually go through with what they say.

Speaking of which, I need to go now. There's a girl I really like, so I need to get into a relationship with her, get her to dump me and then wail and rant about it while taking pictures of myself and cutting my wrists at parties! Oh my God, I love being sad, it's so much fun!

WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Labels: Random Blargh

And To Bookend Velma

The Wife has gone and done the inevitable Daphne rendering. As some have pointed out, there's really not much further you can take Daphne since she was drawn with a certain amount of sex appeal to begin with. But I think the Wife has managed to add a teensy bit more to boost it up a notch. Personally, I still like Velma more, but then I root for the underdog and hate them universally liked cheerleader types...

Labels: Artwork

Observation Of The Day

"The only thing a man loves more than his penis is his car, because that will always be bigger."

--The Wife & I

Also, I just finished writing up an article for GameAxis about a comic book artist named Sonny Liew. This one is a particularly gratifying and at the same weird article, for the simple fact that Sonny's actually a friend of ours, and for about three years, we lived across the street from him. So while on the one hand it was a lot easier to get material because it was a simple matter of just flat out asking him, on the other, it's very strange to be writing about someone you personally know and realizing that there are kids out there that wish they were in the same position he is, and will be hanging off every nugget of wisdom he drops in his interview.

It is a difficult thing to think in fanboy terms of someone if you became friends with them first. Oh well...

Labels: Comics, Journalism, Random Blargh

Round 7: FIGHT!

I am now patiently neglecting the 7th draft of the Script That Wouldn't Die in favor of writing a daily blog post with no substance, insight or value of any kind. Go me. With any luck, there will only be a few more revisions left on this script, though I was kind of hoping that it would have been mostly done by now. At first this program was supposed to have been done by the end of November. Then it was supposed to have been done by December 21st. Now I'm told it likely won't be done until the end of January, which is spectacularly inconvenient for all concerned since I took on the job under the assumption it would be finished before 2007 and now it looks I won't be around by the time it actually goes into editing and voice over.

On the other hand, I am now left with only a few articles to write for GameAxis and a part of me feels weirdly sad about that. It's a good magazine. It's not perfect, but I'm actually pretty proud of the job we've done, and I'm going to miss being a part of the team.

On the other, other hand the occupation of playing games because someone is paying me to review them has now changed to playing games for other reasons entirely which I can't yet talk about. I'm going through The Longest Journey: Dreamfall for a second time, this time paying attention to names, putting more thought into character details and relationships and generally just getting a better, more critical understanding of what is happening in the story. The first time I played was purely for pleasure and was unbelievably fun. This second time is for more creative reasons, and is proving to still be immeasurably fun, but also a lot more interesting now that I'm actually thinking about what's going on, and actively pursuing all the references scattered throughout, such as the many allusions to Australian Aboriginal dreamtime, something I'd completely missed the first playthrough, which is now making many more things in the game much more significant thematically.

Too bad they don't have any "Game Studies" classes in the same way they had Film Studies when I went to university. I'm pretty sure I would have kicked serious ass in such a class.

Labels: Journalism, My Life, Television Production, Writing

When You Lack Trauma Or Drama In Your Life

This happens. Yet another day where I went to the office, wrote some articles (am now churning out my take on the Playstation 3 console) and thought about strange things like art and people and choices and consequences and other assorted things. Okay, granted, I could probably also make a post with a bit more interest to it if I just put in the effort, but I'm feeling lazy and only want to report to talk about things that actually happened, since that's a convenient cop out, and nothing really happened.

I'm going to try and enjoy this little bit of downtime, since there's a move imminent and I've already been warned ahead of time that the Video Game Documentary That Wouldn't Die has once again, zombie like, reared its head for yet another round of changes. Oh well, this too shall pass...

Labels: Games, Journalism

I Played Resistance, Fall Of Man Today

It's a very good game. Part of the inherent appeal, I'm sure, is that it's a launch title and you generally expect those to suck badly, and this one doesn't.

Then I went off to dinner to meet a happy, well-adjusted couple and a small girl with extremely toned arms.

Right. Back to gaming.

Labels: Games

[Insert Hyperattenuated, High Frequency Onomatopoeia Here]

I just had the third best conversation of my life. The second best was the night my Creative Writing Prof took me aside on the last night of class and told me that she believed in my writing enough that she expected to read my stories at some point in the future. The best took place four years ago, when I met The Wife To Be and I realized someone out there finally gave a damn about me enough to want to be with me.

Tonight was the third best because it was a massive collision of a lot of oft spoken hopes and ideas and possibilities and What I Would Do If I Got A Chance To Work On Certain Things.

After meeting with Ragnar yesterday and getting to know him, it was immediately apparent to me that once I took the fanboy blinders off and stopped thinking of him as "The guy that made one of my all time favorite games" and started thinking of him as "The guy who just happened to be the guy standing in front of me" we were both bound by the common link of being hopeless, massive geeks that had read a lot of novels, watched a lot of movies, inhaled a lot of comics and The Sandman and played a lot of games. It would be safe to say that we actually got on pretty well and really enjoyed trading ideas and discussing the many varied and embarrassing aspects of Geek Culture and storytelling. Today the my buddy the editor of GameAxis, as well as The Wife, all got together to a) show Ragnar the somewhat more authentic side of Singapore, away from the shiny shopping belt that is Orchard road and b) geek out some more.

The Wife also brought a few of the finished pages from the Nowhere comic that we're creating together, so Ragnar could get a sense of how uniquely talented she is. He and I, of course, continued to geek about Neil Gaiman, comics, stories and the odd question or two on my part about The Longest Journey series and some of the burning questions I had.

Every once in a while, you meet someone that just kind of fires up your creative juices and really gets you excited about creating something again, about taking pride in creating something and wanting it to be good. Ragnar fired that off for me tonight in a way similar to what happens with The Wife when we discuss our various projects. And it felt really, really good. One of the things that I've really missed since I've been in Singapore is that feeling of community with people that are excited about what they're doing, that love it. That kind of feeling is infectious and easily transmitted. The Wife fills the void in that respect, but tonight was a unique and different flavor coming from someone who I didn't know intimately, and it was just gratifying in profound way to talk with someone about something that had been created, that really mattered to me, and here was the creator sharing his insights. And I got to tug on his ear for a while and tell him what I thought, what I liked, what I wanted to do, and what kinds of things mattered to me.

He looked at the Wife's work. He looked at mine, or at least the writing that was present in the batch of pages, and...

Well, I can't really talk about that, but let's just say that there are distinct possibilities that are brewing in the air now.

And the chance to really make something. Something cool, that I can be proud of. But you know, we'll see...

Labels: Adventure Games, Games, Gaming Industry, My Life

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

That high-pitched, girlish squeal of ultimate loserdoem is the sound a 30+ year old nerd makes when he is confronted with the writer and director of the best adventure games ever made, Ragnar Tornquist of The Longest Journey and Dreamfall fame... and said nerd gets to hang out with him. It is doubly loserly when you consider said nerd had a complete moment of spasmodic fanboyishness, and actually sat there and analyzed Ragnar's games with an insight that hadn't occurred to Ragnar before.

The really killer part is I also get to have dinner with him tomorrow night, and he wants to see some of The Wife's artwork!

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

Labels: Adventure Games, Games, Gaming Industry

The New One

Here's the rough of the latest in what is now officially a series. The Wife has decided she really DOES want to take cartoon characters from shows she's previously ignored and give them new life with her vector technique. This one still has to be properly colored, but it's pretty obvious that Velma, of Scooby Doo fame, now looks like the kind of girl that can attract other girls, since that's her goal as a lesbian and all...

Labels: Artwork

Official Proclomation From The Wife

For the first time ever, an iron-clad, non-negotiable , set-in-stone rule has been laid down upon me by the Wife and it is this:

In the highly unlikely event that we decide we want to start a family after all and the infant is a boy, I am not, not, NOT, NOT, NOT under any circumstances allowed to name him "Mucho."

Nor am I allowed to give him the middle name "Macho."

Nor am I allowed to introduce him as "Mucho Macho Santos" with a grin of perverse pride on my face.

Man, that just about killed 90% of my incentive to even have a family right there...

Labels: Icky Couple Stuff, Random Blargh

Super-Uber-Loser-Nerd-Fanboy Moment #34, 961






















Meeting the man who made Sinistar and saying "Dude, you're awesome."

Which is exactly what happened to me this morning when I went down to a game development conference today.

Labels: Gaming Industry

No Amusing Post Today

I just realized I have three scripts and an episodic synopsis to write...

Labels: Boring And Insipid Posts, Television Production

Santa Claus Is An Islamic Terrorist

After thinking about this for a while, this obvious and inalienable truth occurred to me. There's no other way to explain the way this man operates, save that he is a godless (In the Christian sense, Jewish and Islamic gods are FAKE) heathen that is bent on destroying America.

The first thing that clued me in his schedule. What does he do? HE WORKS ON CHRISTMAS! The holiest day of the year for Real Religions and he's actually throwing it in the face of Christ by working? Who in their right mind would be so flagrantly defiant of such a sacred day, you ask? ONLY A FREAKIN' ISLAMIC TERRORIST BENT ON DESTROYING AMERICA, MY FRIEND...

The other thing that occurred to me is the fact the he regularly and routinely defies all aeronautical law. All other law abiding pilots file flight plans, maintain contact with airports and follow the take off and landing instructions issued by control towers. However, he disregards all this and flies where he pleases. In fact, he flies directly over municipal zones. When was the last time you knew someone who flew directly over a city? Oh yeah, when they destroyed the World Trade Centers! So what's Santa Claus? ONLY A FREAKIN' ISLAMIC TERRORIST BENT ON DESTROYING AMERICA, MY FRIEND...

And let's look at his means of transportation. He uses reindeer. That fly. One of them the subject of hideous mutation experiments so his nose glows a deep, satanic red, to cast a filthy, non-Christian glow on the world below. This is also ungodly because a real Christian would use a horse, like cowboys do (since real Christians are only American, but then you knew that) and the deer, especially one that flies, is a pagan animal, and pagan is just another word for Islam. So what does that make Santa Claus? ONLY A FREAKIN' ISLAMIC TERRORIST BENT ON DESTROYING AMERICA, MY FRIEND...

And finally, there comes the question of funds. All terrorists need Christian dollars to fund their terrorist activities since real Christian countries don't accept terrorist dollars that terrorist use amongst themselves as currency. Santa Claus manages to amass his perverse wealth through two diabolical measures, slave labor and data mining. Through his abominable use of midgets in a unionless, sweatshop he creates a vast collection of toys that he--seemingly out of sheer goodwill--distributes to children who have been good. Of course the truth of the matter is that this list of children he compiles and their requests for toys is actually sold to various interested parties such as toy companies and market research groups who pay top dollar for kind of raw data. Of course it also helps tremendously that these children are also divulging everything from hopeful wishes to detailed layouts of important buildings around the nation. This combination of near infinute, annual fund raising and careful scrutiny of America's innermost defenses leaves the entire country open to who? ONLY A FREAKIN' ISLAMIC TERRORIST BENT ON DESTROYING AMERICA, MY FRIEND...

Labels: Random Blargh

Couldn't Resist

The Wife blew some kind of 80's nostalgia gasket and decided to apply her signature style to iconic blue babe Smurfette. The end result is below and... well, a lot curvier than what I remember...























You can click on it to magnify the view. Man, we really, really need to finish one of our comics...

Update:

I don't know whether its legit or not, but after submitting this picture on her DeviantArt Account, The Wife received this comment:

Wow this is incredible work! It's really quite elegant! I'm the great niece of the creator of the smurfs! If Peyo (Obviosly my great uncle's name) was alive to see this, he'd probably hire you!

Roll "To Hit" with +5 modifier "Spousal Pride!"

Labels: Artwork

New Propaganda Pseudo/Retro/Neo-50's/Post-Modern/Public-Service Revival!

Because I too must utilize the public transportation system a few times a week to get down to the GameAxis office, I've been bombarded during the morning with the a new public service video that runs on the LCD monitors hanging from the ceiling of every train station. These videos, done in a completely unironic, sincere, recreation of 50's style public service films shown to kids in school, instructs train passengers on the appropriate action to take in the event that someone should try to plant a bomb on the train.

The videos faithfully follow the structure of films 50 years past with bad music, bad acting and a voice over that praises the actions of the participants. An example:

Man in sunglasses pushes a bag under his seat, then stands up and walks to the connector between train cars. Mary, a passenger notices this.

Mary: Excuse me, you've left your bag!

The man looks down then walks away anyway.

Narrator: That's right, Mary! You should always notify someone when they've left their bag behind!

John: Excuse me! Hey've you've left your bag behind!

Terrorist: [Looks down at bag, then waves hand dismissively and says in broken English] Not mine, not mine...

Narrator: HM! This is very suspicious!

After being exposed to this for the last few weeks, I now present my much more entertaining and commercially marketable version.

[OPEN WITH THE 20TH CENTURY FOX LOGO, FOLLOWED BY THE SHIMMERING LUCASFILM LOGO]

Narrator chimes in now, but instead of sounding like an enthusiastic nerd, we now have Hollywood VO guy who has been smoking cigarettes since the age of three]

Narrator: It is a city, like any other...

[Cut to woman crying on train holding a bloody body]

Woman: NOOOOOOOOOO!

Narrator: A city with a purpose...

[Cut to man pushing another man up against the wall of the train. Cut to bead of sweat falling from assaulted man's brow as they stare each other down]

Assaulting Man: You're going to DO it, and DO IT NOW!

Narrator: A city that is ABOUT TO DIE...

[Orchestral sting cuts in, a rapid fire montage accompanies showing a car chase, a helicopter zooming between buildings and an explosion]


Narrator: And it all starts with a bag on a train...

[Man dressed up in extremist terrorist clothing jumps onto a train with a transparent suitcase through which a pack of semtex and a detonator can be clearly seen]

Terrorist: I AM JUST A PASSENgER, MINDING MY OWN BUSINESS BY ALLAH! IGNORE ME OR I SHALL KILL YOU IN MY FANATICAL ZEAL TO ENTER PARADISE FOR THE JIHAD, WHICH IS WHAT ALL MORNING COMMUTERS DO!

[Mary from previous video stands up, wearing a trench coat.]

Mary: I don't THINK so...

[She pulls at trench coat to reveal body tight latex suit and bandolier bristling with grenades and ammunition]

Terrorist: [In surprise] ALLAHJIHAD! I FORGOT MY CELLPHONE IN THE OTHER CAR, I'LL JUST...

[He tries to drop the suitcase, which is beeping wildly]

Suitcase: WARNING, WARNING, FISSION REACTION ENABLED. YOU NOW HAVE THREE MINUTES TO REACH MINIMUM SAFE DISTANCE.

Mary: [Brandishing a twin full-auto pistols] Drop the bomb, terrorist.

Terrorist: AI! HOW DID YOU KNOW?!

Mary: I can smell evil.

Terrorist: But can you smell... NINJAS?!

[A troupe of ninjas appears from nowhere and begins rapidly cycling through various martial arts poses, punctuating each move with "KI-YAI!"]

Mary: Do you like primates and beer?

Terrorist: What?

Mary: I said, do you like primates and beer?

Terrorist: What does that have to do with my ninjas?

Mary: 'CAUSE YOU'RE ABOUT TO GET A FACEFUL OF DRUNKEN MONKEY FIST! HEEEEE-YAH!

[Mary proceeds to kick 12 different kinds of ass while a plucky reporter and her kid sidekick defuse the bomb while getting talked through it by specialists over the radio]

See, I like my version better...

Labels: Singapore Stupidity, Stupid Scripts

I Repeat

Final Fantasy XII is freakin' HUGE.

Over 150 hours on that bastard and still not done...

Labels: Boring And Insipid Posts, Games, RPGs