I’m amazed at the site of such a beautiful environment that Final Fantasy 11 provides and yet with the people that live in it must appreciate the same. Abundant cities of avatars doing as they please to make their adventures more entertaining and worthwhile lies usually three to four large areas where avatars can roam. The place to find the most people of course would be the shopping areas. There are many different ways to interact with another avatar. Interacting with other avatars is very different from interacting with NPC just like interacting with someone in real life is different from interacting with someone in a virtual world.
As I gaze through my avatars eyes, I see a city filled with avatars doing all sorts of things. Standing around, looking for groups, browsing bazaars, flooding the auction house with items and fulfilling quests is what brings joy to most avatars in this world. Heading north through Jeuno’s stoned streets, avatars are everywhere. To the right you have your group of bazaars people who stands there selling items from they’re inventory to make some money. To the left you’ll see the auction house windows, waiting on many people to sell items to the highest bidders. Further down to the left you’ll see many synthesizers using their arts to create new items from just scraps and crystals. Then you have those random people standing around away from their keyboard or looking for a group or a teleport that sometimes would take hours at a time. The liveliness of every city in this game lies near the auction house. The auction house is where social economy booms. Avatars are selling and trading their goods to other people to make money, just like an online auction site, like EBAY. Down the street from the auction house would be the in-game shops with synthesizers lined outside the doors. The bazaars right across the cobblestone causeway from the auction house would be the downtown market and avatars would shout throughout the city for teleports somewhere outside of the city would be the taxis.
There are so many things to do and so many different types of avatars to interact with. I met a Taru Taru avatar named Ninjaru that really never played the storyline of the game; he only played to craft items. Being an amazing bone-crafter he traded me a couple spiked necklaces for some large fangs I picked up in the Jugner Forest from killing black panthers. Kittenmitt, the Mithra, was another cool avatar that I met on my journey that loved to bazaar. She would clean out her entire inventory and put everything that she wanted to sell in there that she had gathered from unusual places. Countless people would come up to her and browse the bazaar. By the end of the night she would have sold nearly everything. Some of the stuff looked completely useless to me, but I guess someone needed it. Stonedelf was my best friend in this game. He was a young Elvaan, like me, inspired by achieving glory by going out of the cities and fighting alongside me. Stonedelf and I would group up and take long journeys out to the Altepa Desert and farm death scorpions together. Like real life, finding friends in the virtual world can be a little bit difficult depending on how social you are.
Although most interactions are friendly in Final Fantasy you do occasionally have your quarrels. Usually the bickering is only about political issues happening in real life or how some players lost experience because of another avatar. People do tend to be very rude in virtual worlds. Due to the thought that mostly everyone in this world are random people with random names, no one can find each other and the true nature of the avatar comes out because he or she is free to do what they want and not bound by the nature of real life. There are some consequences in the game that will prohibit an avatar from doing certain things and constantly harassing other avatars. The game jail is where monsters instantly kill you if you leave the cell and your experience will be lost or a suspension from the game due to misconduct. I’m sure that interactions would be different if those two avatars met that same avatar in real life. I don’t think they would get into a fist fight from talking about Obama and McCain, due to the fact that there are much more dire consequences than being in virtual world.
It’s very different interacting with the actual game than another avatar. With other avatars you could get a variety of different responses. From emotes that give out hugs, kisses, comfort, and claps of excitement to other responses that disapprove, feel angry, make rude gestures and even slap the other avatar are given responses that avatar could use to feel more interactive. Some of the motions of the interactions are visible and others are not. Interacting with the game however is usually straight forward or gives you a couple options to choose but all leading to the same response give or take. Like most MMOs or RPGs for that matter, NPCs usually give the same prompt unless the story is progressing. This makes the game less responsive as it could be.
Very much so like a real city, many avatars are attracted to buying and selling goods. You could see the same interactions at a downtown marketplace or a mini mall. In this marketplace, since there is a majority of avatars there, many interactions occur. Like almost every MMO I’ve seen, there is a limit to what the avatar can do based on the content and objective of the game. NPCs won’t interact with the other avatars very much unless the story has progress to that NPC. The responses to other avatars could be unlimited to whatever the user’s imagination can see. Interacting with the avatars in the game would be very different from real life due to thoughts and consequences of being in the vicinity with that person.
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Thoughts of the Age
When I think of diamond age, I think of the ages of Greek history, in which every age set forth the coming of a new era. Upon reading Diamond Age I get the feeling that this is not a diamond age at all. When I think of diamonds, unlike silver, gold and bronze, I think of perfection, but the age in which Nell grows up in is very flawed. The drummers are weird. The primer that Nell and the other girls use to learn from is a very interesting technology though it is not always useful.
The society in Diamond Age is more technically advanced than the society we live in today, but with that technically advanced society it seems as though the world has spun into a more chaotic place than our own. Nanotechnology and computer literacy thrives in the world Nell lives in and it is normal for people to use it, but it seems as though the more technology people have, the world goes further and further into a dystopia. Tribal societies at war, thetes pillaging the streets using guns that are smaller than their hands, and an abundance of orphans that do not have anywhere to live. Peace and harmony exists very little in this world and it doesn’t seem like the problems between people have changed much, only the technology. Although the technology seems fantastic in some ways than others, it seems as though it could be more dangerous and risky to have.
The colony of the drummers is very interesting. It was difficult to understand exactly what they were doing because their strange culture was stunned me as I read through some of the words. The rituals used by the drummers was very unique and I could not understand why exactly they were doing it. Only in a technically advanced age would they people to hack other people’s minds and that’s what I think I’ve concluded to. The drummers would use their bodily contact to hack into other people minds through nanotechnology, which almost ingenious, but the rituals honestly seemed mildly outrageous.
I also thought it was interesting that the girls that given the primers did not grow up the same way. The best affect of the primer happened to Nell. She grew up to be extremely smart, and a great leader, thanks to the primer and the ractor that stayed with her named Miranda. The effect was not the same coming from Lord Finkle-McGraw’s granddaughter, Elizabeth. She actually wasn’t very interested in the stories the primer were teaching her and grew out of them quickly, thus becoming a member of the CryptNet later in the story. The primer also worked differently with Fiona Hackworth as well. Three different girls leading three different lives. Not to mention the orphans that obtained the primers, who eventually became an army for Nell. I think what effected these girls the most was the people that were around them and how they were being taught through the primer that changed their lifestyle the most.
The society in Diamond Age is more technically advanced than the society we live in today, but with that technically advanced society it seems as though the world has spun into a more chaotic place than our own. Nanotechnology and computer literacy thrives in the world Nell lives in and it is normal for people to use it, but it seems as though the more technology people have, the world goes further and further into a dystopia. Tribal societies at war, thetes pillaging the streets using guns that are smaller than their hands, and an abundance of orphans that do not have anywhere to live. Peace and harmony exists very little in this world and it doesn’t seem like the problems between people have changed much, only the technology. Although the technology seems fantastic in some ways than others, it seems as though it could be more dangerous and risky to have.
The colony of the drummers is very interesting. It was difficult to understand exactly what they were doing because their strange culture was stunned me as I read through some of the words. The rituals used by the drummers was very unique and I could not understand why exactly they were doing it. Only in a technically advanced age would they people to hack other people’s minds and that’s what I think I’ve concluded to. The drummers would use their bodily contact to hack into other people minds through nanotechnology, which almost ingenious, but the rituals honestly seemed mildly outrageous.
I also thought it was interesting that the girls that given the primers did not grow up the same way. The best affect of the primer happened to Nell. She grew up to be extremely smart, and a great leader, thanks to the primer and the ractor that stayed with her named Miranda. The effect was not the same coming from Lord Finkle-McGraw’s granddaughter, Elizabeth. She actually wasn’t very interested in the stories the primer were teaching her and grew out of them quickly, thus becoming a member of the CryptNet later in the story. The primer also worked differently with Fiona Hackworth as well. Three different girls leading three different lives. Not to mention the orphans that obtained the primers, who eventually became an army for Nell. I think what effected these girls the most was the people that were around them and how they were being taught through the primer that changed their lifestyle the most.
Friday, October 10, 2008
Exploring Final Fantasy 11
The game starts off with an incredibly stunning cinematic that drove me to play even more. The four civilizations are fleeing to a well-built keep on top of a ridge, to uphold an invasion by an immense collection of beastmen. Usually beastmen aren’t smart enough to collectively come together to make an army, but they have done so with help. The camera follows the story of two orphans, that couldn’t be over 11 years old, who are fleeing with the soldiers before nightfall. Nightfall appears, and the combined forces of beastmen appear out of the night with fury. The infantry of people used their various fighting skills to hold them off. Magic and arrows were being littered into the night air at the beastmen. Holding back the beastmen using all their might, the beastmen manage to infiltrate the keep, and overrun it. Innocent civilians are being chased and killed everywhere by the vicious beastmen with no intention of mercy. The keep is then overwhelmed in chaos. Then turning to the two orphans, Aldo and Emilan, two beastmen were thirsty for blood. Fleeing for their lives they manage to find a hole that leads them out the back of the keep, but Emilan protecting her younger brother took the sacrifice and was never seen again. The keep ended in ruins. Twenty years later, a new gathering of soldiers returns to the ruined keep, with Aldo, to begin to start over again. This cinematic encouraged me to play, through revenge. I feel that as one of Aldo’s accomplices, it is my solemn duty to return the favor to the beastmen that has caused much pain and suffering.
Creating a player is fun, though you only get one character really, and any other character you own, you have to pay an additional dollar. Supposedly you really only need one character though, but extra characters are good for banking valuable goods. First you could choose between 5 different races, Galka, Elvaan, Hume, Mithra, and Taru Taru. Then you could choose which of the three countries you will stand for, in which Galka and Hume are together to form Bastock, Mithra and Taru Taru presides over Windurst, and Elvaans reign over San D’Oria. Each them having their own racial advantages they compose the civilization you play for. I am a male Elvaan, from San D’Oria, here to protect the collective races of the world at which we know as Vana’diel. I picked this Elvaan, because he is one of the most agile characters in the game and still more powerful than a hume. Though his magic isn’t as powerful, he can deal powerful melee damage and be able to avoid attacks as well. If I were an actual Elvaan living in this world of Vana’diel, this character would be just like me. This character might make the impression that I am playing with a person that is tall and young in real life, or tall and young at heart. On top of that you could be any class you want to be instead of that same warrior-class the whole game. You can change your class throughout the game to whatever you want to be, keeping your inventory throughout the game.
Out of all the MMOs I’ve played, this is by far one of the most beautiful landscapes I’ve seen. Overlooking miles upon mile of incredible landscapes are the four kingdoms that separate each other. This world was built with spectacular realistic design. From forests to deserts and swamps to beaches the scenery changes so drastically that even fly from above the ground on airships, you could almost tell exactly where you are.
Though the games environmental beauty is mesmerizing, the difficulty of the game just skyrocketed. Interlaced with problems finding people throughout the cities, you have lack of movement in the character. Unfortunately, the only visible interaction that you could physically do with your keyboard is target people, talk to people, and run. That is correct; you are in a no jumping game. The interface for this game is a bit different I must say. The usual keys to move in an MMO are thrown out the window. Using the number-pad on the right side of your keyboard are the movement keys, which I found a bit different to use and does take quite some time to get used to. Creating macros in this game helps out a ton, when fighting enemies.
The game is difficult to play, but that is what makes the game fun. The sense of a challenge, willpower and determination to master all your classes and be the ultimate member of your civilization is your goal. Defeating as many of the beastmen as possible, meeting new people, and unraveling the story behind what is to become of Vana’diel is the plot of my new adventure ahead of me. Though the times when camping out in different environments may be hard, and discovering new tactics, skills and magic to defeat my enemies will be put to the test, my virtue for keeping this world safe is more than just a dream of mine. It is a dream of every other adventurer like me who plays.
Sunday, October 5, 2008
cyberpunk timeline
1995
Movies – The Net, Hackers, Strange Days, Johnny Mnemonic, Tank Girl, The Fifth Element, 12 Monkeys, Ghost in the Shell, Toy Story was the first full computer animated movie, Judge Dredd
Book – Diamond Age was published, Cyberpunk handbook was published
Technology – MP3 files began to spread on internet, Napster created, Viaweb became the first online store
Games – Sega Saturn
1996
Movie - Escape from LA, Eraser
Technology – Dolly the sheep cloned, the Tamagachi was created and became popular, Fossil bacteria found in meteorite on mars
Games – Nintendo 64, new controller style
Other – Netrunner collectable card game
Mibracc Attack
The men in the back of the country club by Rudy Rucker was a very different cyberpunk story from the others that I’ve read. It seemed as if this story wasn’t too far off from the present day future because of some of the technology they were still using. Normally when brought a cyberpunk book or video, I would think of the usual futuristic theme, with integrated cultures, metropolitan areas that are the size of the planet itself, and futuristic technology that surpasses anything we could think to make in our lifetime. This story did generate some new technology advancements which are pretty impressive. This story had a nice mixture of what life could be probably a decade from now, excluding the ending of course. The ending of the story produces the reason to which this story is classified as an apocalyptic cyberpunk.
The Mibraccs (Men in the Back of the Country Club) of course are the most technically advanced part of this story. I can’t say exactly what they are but I would guess they are somewhat like a T-1000 from Terminator 2, only without the shape-shifting. Instead they have skin and is composed of some kind of a liquid substance known as smeel. These men aren’t really harmful until about the end of the story where they go haywire and start killing people. The idea behind these men is actually a bit scary. Something that is not killable to be frank is pretty scary.
One of the technologies that was in the story was, I’m guessing a type of nicorette gum, but for marijuana. “Danny tightened down the cover of the quilted chrome wagon and unwrapped a stick of marijuana gum, the pricey brand called Winnipeg Wheelchair.” I could honestly see, Winnipeg Wheelchair, being something invented in the future. Only because there are a lot of people wanting the drug to be legalized, and that could be a possible form of getting around the law. I’m also assuming that this gum does not help you quit marijuana, just a better way to consume it without getting caught. I think it’s fairly possible to create a substance while chewing the gum, a lot like nicotine, that could secrete a substance that produces a relaxing and hallucinogen drug. Now that I think about it, that doesn’t seem that far away at all.
A couple reasons why I think this story could be close to the time we’re living in, is the technology other than the mibraccs and a particular event that describes one character. For one, they still use motorized vehicles to travel around and they use the same parts we use today; “Tonel popped the hood and set to work extracting the battery while Jack began pumping gas from Ragland's tank. It felt stupid to be making such a complicated thing out of getting a car.” The main characters were trying to steal pieces of their neighbor’s car to put in their own. Tonel’s Father, Vincente, “learned electronics in the Navy during the second war on Iraq” was another event thought filled event that doesn’t seem too far either. Other things like the use of recliners, cell phones, and beat up old bicycles make this story seem more down to earth than a lot of the other cyberpunk stories I’ve read.
This story does share a common cyberpunk theme through some sci-fi films and books, which is the apocalypse to come. The ending has an unruly twist to the realism that was shown through most of the story. It breaks into its science-fiction roots and brings about chaos and destruction, after the plot had thickened with the main characters. Technology shows its true face and coordinates a hostile takeover. So I guess we all must be fearful of the technology that we conjure because it may not be that we end ourselves but something else that ends us. Taking this all in, I think that Rudy Rucker comes up with some ideas about the future that seem not too far from our time, and the possibility of some of them coming true, couldn’t be doubtful.
The Mibraccs (Men in the Back of the Country Club) of course are the most technically advanced part of this story. I can’t say exactly what they are but I would guess they are somewhat like a T-1000 from Terminator 2, only without the shape-shifting. Instead they have skin and is composed of some kind of a liquid substance known as smeel. These men aren’t really harmful until about the end of the story where they go haywire and start killing people. The idea behind these men is actually a bit scary. Something that is not killable to be frank is pretty scary.
One of the technologies that was in the story was, I’m guessing a type of nicorette gum, but for marijuana. “Danny tightened down the cover of the quilted chrome wagon and unwrapped a stick of marijuana gum, the pricey brand called Winnipeg Wheelchair.” I could honestly see, Winnipeg Wheelchair, being something invented in the future. Only because there are a lot of people wanting the drug to be legalized, and that could be a possible form of getting around the law. I’m also assuming that this gum does not help you quit marijuana, just a better way to consume it without getting caught. I think it’s fairly possible to create a substance while chewing the gum, a lot like nicotine, that could secrete a substance that produces a relaxing and hallucinogen drug. Now that I think about it, that doesn’t seem that far away at all.
A couple reasons why I think this story could be close to the time we’re living in, is the technology other than the mibraccs and a particular event that describes one character. For one, they still use motorized vehicles to travel around and they use the same parts we use today; “Tonel popped the hood and set to work extracting the battery while Jack began pumping gas from Ragland's tank. It felt stupid to be making such a complicated thing out of getting a car.” The main characters were trying to steal pieces of their neighbor’s car to put in their own. Tonel’s Father, Vincente, “learned electronics in the Navy during the second war on Iraq” was another event thought filled event that doesn’t seem too far either. Other things like the use of recliners, cell phones, and beat up old bicycles make this story seem more down to earth than a lot of the other cyberpunk stories I’ve read.
This story does share a common cyberpunk theme through some sci-fi films and books, which is the apocalypse to come. The ending has an unruly twist to the realism that was shown through most of the story. It breaks into its science-fiction roots and brings about chaos and destruction, after the plot had thickened with the main characters. Technology shows its true face and coordinates a hostile takeover. So I guess we all must be fearful of the technology that we conjure because it may not be that we end ourselves but something else that ends us. Taking this all in, I think that Rudy Rucker comes up with some ideas about the future that seem not too far from our time, and the possibility of some of them coming true, couldn’t be doubtful.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
Battle of the Androids and Replicants
It’s hard to predict the future many years ahead of your own time. In 1968, Philip K. Dick had written Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? with a riveting complex futuristic plot that would grasp a group of people and change the way they viewed their upcoming years. The novel was then released into a movie produced by Ridley Scott; known as Blade Runner, in 1982. There were a vast amount of differences between the movie and the book. The only reason I could think of to why the many changes is because times change and so does people interests through many generations. Even though this book is published and not an orally based story, still Ridley Scott felt the need to put his own ideas into an already built artistic masterpiece, to make it seem more appealing to the public.
In the book, Deckard is married. He wakes up to his wife in a bad mood due to a device called a mood organ, which is not in the film. She disapproves of his job as bounty hunter, killing androids, because of this religion known as Mercerism, which is also not in the film. Nevertheless, he is not married in the film so you throw all of that away. Deckard, played by Harrison Ford in the film, is attracted to the replicant Rachael in the film, which makes the story a bit different. These changes does not necessarily change the theme of the movie, it just makes it more appealing to the average movie viewer. Having the main character attracted to the very things that he is supposed to destroy, makes the movie an interesting twist. In the book, Rachael the character is different. She is used for company gain only, to sniff out information regarding the Nexus-6 android’s flaws though bounty hunters and their use of the Voight-Kampff test.
Though the movie does make certain remarks about animals being robotic and their outrageous quality, it does not obsess about it as much as the book. Deckard is using his low pay bounty hunting money that he gains in the book to buy a real sheep instead of the electric ones. But why are animals this rare commodity in the book? User 1318 from the kuro5hin.org diaries explains “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep is structured around the fake religion of Mercerism, that doesn’t exist in Blade Runner. Mercerism is a strange cult that seems to exist for the sole purpose of affirming the “empathetic union” of life forms.” So, Deckard and his wife, owning a real sheep would further symbolize their humanistic expressions.
Another crashing moment that is in the film that leaves the viewer thinking was the question “Is Deckard an android?” The movie explains the role of memory implants and how replicants can have memories to make them feel more realistic. This is the same plot that also surrounds Rachael throughout most of the film. She finds out that she is a replicant through Deckard, and has a mental breakdown because she thought she had been human her whole life. Deckard has some arguable moments that he is a replicant as well. How does one come to dream of a unicorn when one has never had the actual experience to see one? In his world, unicorns do not exist. He dreams that moment, and later there is a origami unicorn, made by one of the other blade runners and placed on his doorstep. This event lets the viewer believe that he knows what kind of memories or dreams Deckard has. Others insist there is no definitive answer, and that the clues merely "suggest" Deckard might be a replicant. I think this post from David Caldwell’s site, http://www.brmovie.com/, has some great insight when they answer with this statement, “Some accept Deckard as a replicant because of the clues, but feel he shouldn't be, because they feel the movie works just as well if not better if he's human or if the question is left "unanswered.” I really agree with this statement, because people viewing it and people reading about it will come up with different answers and this argument would just go on forever, and it is the best choice to leave it an unsolved mystery. It would just make perfect since to leave most of the questions unanswered since the end of the movie was really left open ended. Collectively vast differences come from different minds in different times.
Work Cited
Cowie, Johnathan. "Blade Runner vs. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep"
last update: 4/15/08, http://www.concatenation.org/contact.html
In the book, Deckard is married. He wakes up to his wife in a bad mood due to a device called a mood organ, which is not in the film. She disapproves of his job as bounty hunter, killing androids, because of this religion known as Mercerism, which is also not in the film. Nevertheless, he is not married in the film so you throw all of that away. Deckard, played by Harrison Ford in the film, is attracted to the replicant Rachael in the film, which makes the story a bit different. These changes does not necessarily change the theme of the movie, it just makes it more appealing to the average movie viewer. Having the main character attracted to the very things that he is supposed to destroy, makes the movie an interesting twist. In the book, Rachael the character is different. She is used for company gain only, to sniff out information regarding the Nexus-6 android’s flaws though bounty hunters and their use of the Voight-Kampff test.
Though the movie does make certain remarks about animals being robotic and their outrageous quality, it does not obsess about it as much as the book. Deckard is using his low pay bounty hunting money that he gains in the book to buy a real sheep instead of the electric ones. But why are animals this rare commodity in the book? User 1318 from the kuro5hin.org diaries explains “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep is structured around the fake religion of Mercerism, that doesn’t exist in Blade Runner. Mercerism is a strange cult that seems to exist for the sole purpose of affirming the “empathetic union” of life forms.” So, Deckard and his wife, owning a real sheep would further symbolize their humanistic expressions.
Another crashing moment that is in the film that leaves the viewer thinking was the question “Is Deckard an android?” The movie explains the role of memory implants and how replicants can have memories to make them feel more realistic. This is the same plot that also surrounds Rachael throughout most of the film. She finds out that she is a replicant through Deckard, and has a mental breakdown because she thought she had been human her whole life. Deckard has some arguable moments that he is a replicant as well. How does one come to dream of a unicorn when one has never had the actual experience to see one? In his world, unicorns do not exist. He dreams that moment, and later there is a origami unicorn, made by one of the other blade runners and placed on his doorstep. This event lets the viewer believe that he knows what kind of memories or dreams Deckard has. Others insist there is no definitive answer, and that the clues merely "suggest" Deckard might be a replicant. I think this post from David Caldwell’s site, http://www.brmovie.com/, has some great insight when they answer with this statement, “Some accept Deckard as a replicant because of the clues, but feel he shouldn't be, because they feel the movie works just as well if not better if he's human or if the question is left "unanswered.” I really agree with this statement, because people viewing it and people reading about it will come up with different answers and this argument would just go on forever, and it is the best choice to leave it an unsolved mystery. It would just make perfect since to leave most of the questions unanswered since the end of the movie was really left open ended. Collectively vast differences come from different minds in different times.
Work Cited
Cowie, Johnathan. "Blade Runner vs. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep"
last update: 4/15/08, http://www.concatenation.org/contact.html
User 1318. "Blade Runner vs. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep"
7/9/05, http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2005/7/9/45918/48434
Carreon, Maria. "Blade Runner vs. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep"
Copyright 2006, http://www.phildick.com/Blade_Runner
McGrievy, Matt. "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (Blade Runner)"
August of 1998, http://www.gslis.utexas.edu/~palmquis/courses/reviews/matt.htm
Caldwell, David. "The Blade Runner FAQ: Is Deckar a Replicant"
Last update June 26, 2008, http://www.brmovie.com/FAQs/BR_FAQ_Deck-a-Rep.htm
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