Movies done PROPERLY, dammit!

Oh joy! I've heard there is going to be a reboot of the reboot of Ocean's Eleven. I like this. I like this a lot. The Ocean's Eleven trilogy (that is, the first Ocean's Eleven reboot and it's sequels Ocean's Twelve and Ocean's Thirteen) rank amongst my top favourite films. To me, these are how movies should be done for a number of reasons.

I find modern film more and more grating. With the rise of CGI, films have become more of a visual spectacle and a times it feels like they're thinking more about what would make a cool action sequence rather than developing interesting characters and plot. I find the dialogue very bland, particularly in the delivery. Far too many films have their characters deliver lines in a very dry, monotonous tone with no emotional inflection what so ever. You may as well use a text-to-speech program and get the same overall tone. There's just no personality to the dialogue. The writing itself can be pretty bad, too. At times a line of dialogue feels like the screenwriter was trying to come up the most dramatic thing someone could say rather than something someone WOULD say in a given situation. 

Ocean's 11, 12 and 13 are brilliant. Very rarely do lines feel like 'movie' dialogue. Ok, Julia Roberts must not have gotten that memo in Ocean's Eleven, but she did a better job in 12. While I feel Ocean's 12 was the weaker of the three films, with a few awkward moments (but overall still a great film), it contains the best examples of dialogue done right. There are times when characters are in an open discussion, and occasionally they talk over one another, or start to deliver a line only to change tack mid word and say something else. It looks like they are thinking as they speak rather than regurgitating a pre-written line. In Ocean's Thirteen, during the interview between Terry Benedict and Oprah Winfrey, you get the impression that he is on the spot and has to think about what to say on the fly. Still speaking of Ocean's Thirteen, something else they did right was the portrayal of computers. There's a sequence where the security staff at William Bank's casino are running an 'all known associates' search against a suspect. As they enter the data, all we hear is the typing of the keyboard and the hum of the servers in the background. In pretty much ANY film or TV show, everything that we see happening on a computer screen is accompanied by a sound effect. This does not happen. I mean really - look at your own computer how often does doing something within your operating system make a noise? Hardly ever. It's this kind of inaccurate representation compared to the real world that gets on my nerves (as you can see, I'm a picky bastard).

So yes, really, really looking forward to the next Ocean's film. They're going for a female centric cast this time which could be interesting. Steven Soderbergh is back to direct, and George Clooney is on board to assist, so I'm hoping for good things.

Fox character rig and more Starfox Zero news

Some more concepts relating to my potential Starfox animations. Here's the turnaround for the character rig of Fox. As I've said in previous posts, I'm basing him more off his Starfox Adventures appearance, with a little bit of the Fox Amiibo thrown in for reference. While the shoes are influenced somewhat by SF Adventures, I might change them so if you have a better idea, let me know.

This might be the last of the Starfox related stuff I'll do for a while. I'm trying to discipline myself to not start a new project until I've finished my current one. I'm still trying to push to get my Unstable Housewife clip finished, then I have another animated short in mind before I had planned to get into Starfox. The rigs of Fox and Krystal were made as a fun little diversion.

Speaking of Starfox, I recently found out that Starfox Zero is going to be delayed until 
1st quarter 2016.

YES!

Given my obvious love for the franchise, you may be puzzled as to why I consider the delay a good thing.

I like to think a game is all it can be given the time and resources allocated to it. The notion of a developer pouring everything they can and making it the best they can is reassuring that the end product will be of decent quality.

This is why I tend to dislike things such as Day One DLC. To me it gives the impression content has deliberately been held back in order to squeeze out a few more coins from us. Yes, I know this is often misunderstood, as the downtime between when a game is finished to when it is ready to go on sale, can allow for the developers to whip up some extra content. But this still feels like we're not getting the whole package when we should. And if the DLC is available the same time the full game gets released, why can't it be bundled together for a single price? I'm fine with paying for DLC after a game has been out for a while, as the development is presumably funded by the sales of the main game, but during the initial launch, everything should be available together. But anyway, I'm digressing...

If I recall correctly, I think StarFox 0 had originally been slated for an early 2016 release but was brought forward to November 2015 a little while ago. I was actually bit miffed to hear it was coming out sooner than expected. Oh sure, if a game gets finished sooner than anticipated and it's everything the developer had set to achieve, then by all means release it. But I like to think the longer a game is in development, the more gameplay and content it would contain. I know that delays can be bad for a developers, as the longer a game is in development, the higher the costs end up in terms of wages and restocking the biscuits in the break room. But like I said, it gives me the impression the developer cares about the project and if the game is better as a result, then hopefully it also raises consumer confidence for future projects. Blizzard are notorious (in a good way) for delaying the releases of their games - even before their juggernaut money earner World Of Warcraft came around to continually finance them. Even here I didn't mind. Yes, it was frustrating to hear of delays when you wanted the game and you wanted it yesterday, but Blizzard have always delivered a quality product as a result.

Besides, even though Starfox may be delayed, I've still got Fallout 4 to look forward to for a November release.

Nintendo(n't put that up on YouTube)

Ugh. It's been a while hasn't it? I've been flat out busy for the past few weeks with my job and just haven't had the energy to update my blog. However I've taken an extended weekend to refresh so now is as good as time as any, particularly since once I head back to work, I'll be busy again.

Anywho, here is a turnaround for the character rig I have made of Starfox's Krystal, for the animations I hope to be able to get around to doing. Still a few tweaks to do, such as hand shapes for each angle and I've just realised I haven't drawn the belt pouches on a few angles, but overall you get the idea. It may be some time before I get around to doing some Starfox animation, not only due to the lethargy I've got thanks to work, but also because I have a couple other projects I'd like to get done first.

Though if I do make something, I'm concerned it may be for naught. At present, Nintendo are clamping down handing out copyright infringement claims to any video on YouTube that feature footage/music etc from games they have published. This... this is just plain DUMB and makes me angry. Yes, you could argue in this case that YouTubers are using (and sometimes profiting off) someone else's intellectual property which is technically copyright infringement, but the games industry generally tends to turn a blind eye over these things. Video games are an interactive experience. To get full enjoyment, you need to play them. Watching a video of a game will not fill this void. These aren't music or movies, where uploading something allows the user to experience something they would otherwise have to pay for. The video game industry would not lose revenue by people uploading videos of their games. If anything, it boosts it. A video can show the viewer how the games looks as well as how it plays. It can generate interest and make people think 'ooh, that looks like fun, maybe I'll give it a go.' It's basically free advertising - it showcases a game without the developers/publishers having to pay any money. I mean, I've bought games I wouldn't have otherwise picked up or even known about this way. Hell, it was some YouTube gameplay footage that made me finally decide to buy a Playstation 4 (which is another reason for the lull in blog posts. The PS4 is fuuuuun).

By removing these 'offending' videos, Nintendo are basically shooting themselves in the foot. Without mainstream exposure, they are narrowing their customer base. I'm sure there are many people that would find Nintendo games a lot of fun, they just need to be shown what's out there. I know Ninty do a lot of things in their own way, but it infuriates me that they seem to be increasingly out of touch with important industry trends.

This brings me back to my Starfox animations. While the animations would be of my own creation, they still are based off the Starfox franchise - which I don't own the rights to. So my concern is that if I was to put up something, it may get one of those copyright strikes. But since the strikes focus more on video game footage, maybe I'll be ok.

Me no likie Steam

No pictures this time. Instead, you get to experience me having a rant, so grab a drink, get some snacks and sit down and relax as I ramble on for a bit. Hopefully I don't come off as too much of and angry nutter.

Anyway, I'm here to whine about Valve's Steam service. It hasn't done anything specific recently to gain my ire, but these are some points I've been meaning to get across for a while now.

I dislike Steam. No - scratch that - I despise the service with every fibre of my being ever since I was first forced to use it. It began with Half Life 2. Up until that point, you used to buy a PC game, install it, maybe enter a CD key, then enjoy. But oh no, Valve wanted to complicate things by throwing in an online requirement. Installing Half Life 2 took ages. At first the game installs off the disc, but towards the end it decides it needs to download the rest (admittedly, these may be updates, but come on, leave it until AFTER I've been able to play and enjoy a bit of the game). Even later on after installation there were Steam updates and additional updates for Half Life 2. Now, even though this was 2004, we still had dial-up speed internet at our place, so anything that required a download was excruciatingly slow. These were speeds where 10Mb took an hour to download. Later on, an update for the game failed which left me being unable to run the game. 

Even when we upgraded to broadband, there were still plenty of problems. Steam would often fail to connect and the process of installing a game was often awkward and sluggish, even though I was installing off a disc. I wanted to avoid buying the game as a digital download, as file sizes would have taken too long for our internet. I had an odd issue with Serious Sam 3 (I didn't know at the time of purchase it was a Steam game. If I did, I wouldn't have bought it.). When attempting to install it, Steam decided to download the game from scratch. I bought the game on a disc! Why did it start dowloading and not install from the disc?! Then there was the time I was installing Company of Heroes 2. It installed from the disc but like I've mentioned with HL 2, it downloads the last few percent of the game. With CoH 2, this worked out to be several GB worth. While we did have broadband, it was slow broadband (welcome to Australia) and our speed meant 1 GB would take around 3 hours. Both the files sizes for Serious Sam 3 and the last 'little' bit of CoH 2 were 5 GB, so to hell with that. We also had data caps with our internet (again, hello Australian internet), so persevering with the download was not worth it.

I'll admit that most of my issues with Steam involved having less than ideal internet. What I have now is much faster and with a high data cap, so the process of downloading/installing is far less painful than what it once was, but Steam is still a flawed system. The problem is you HAVE to use Steam to access their games and if there is a problem at their end, you suffer. As I've mentioned, it occasionally takes a few attempts to be able to actually log onto Steam (I'm exaggerating a bit on the frequency, but it is annoying every time I can't connect), so if I can't access Steam, I can't play the games I paid good money for. 

There was one time when Steam just outright would not run. I tried to re-install it and that didn't work, so I had to delete Steam, then install it again. Deleting the Steam Client also erases ALL associated games from your hard drive. The save game files still remain, but you still have to install all your games all over again.

This is not good for the world of gaming. The ability to play and enjoy your games should not be riding on the functionality of a single program. Look at it this way - what if the Steam service had to be shut down suddenly? In an instant, everyone would have access cut off from their games (and no, Steam's Offline Mode does not count). It gets worse - in an online video I once watched that talked about what would happen if Steam disappeared, one of the issues they brought up was a clause in the Steam EULA stating that Valve/Steam/whatever are not obligated to compensate anyone for the games they bought in the past and can no longer play, should Steam eff off and die. Of course with the amount of money Valve make, shutting down does not seem likely. However with recent events like the suggestion of paid mods, the lack of quality control with games through Steam Greenlight and various other things that have gained the ire of customers, they risk pushing us too far. I've already stopped buying games over Steam. Fallout 4 will probably be an exception, though. Dammit.

This brings me to a point of how things should be done and so, I point you towards gog.com. This is digital distribution done much better. The first benefit is simple - you can access the website and browse the library of games, even without creating an account first. Everything else - Steam, Origin, UPlay etc, is very much 'closed doors'. You don't get to see anything  until you commit to creating an account (Pretty sure this is how they operate but I admit I haven't double checked). One of the other benefits with GOG is that when you download a game, you download a separate install file, rather than downloading something attached to the system's client. So if you happen to say, buy a new computer, you can copy your downloaded files onto your new system without having to go through the download process all over again. The third benefit is the obvious one - in that gog.com provide games DRM free. No external application to be shackled to in order to enjoy your games. I love it how gog.com trust us in this way and I do hope we uphold this trust by not unlawfully distributing games they buy. Of course, this DRM-free approach means it has limited the range of games compared to other digital distribution sites, as various publishers are a bit iffy providing games DRM-free (see? This is what you've done, you game pirates!) but if we continue to support services like gog.com in the way they intend, then maybe the gaming industry will treat consumers like human beings again.

I will say something that Steam does better is updates. When an update is available, it automatically downloads it for the game and away you go. GOG is less straightforward. Sometimes a separate update .exe file is available for a game, but most other times it's the main install files that are updated, meaning the whole game has to be downloaded again. Although in recent times gog.com have launched GOG Galaxy. I haven't used it much, but it seems to provide the ability to update games in a more efficient manner.

So, yeah. It would be nice if everyone stopped supporting Steam and their draconian ways, but I know a lot of you don't mind Steam one bit and this blog entry is nothing more than the ranting of a madman. Overall Steam is... ok I admit, I just find it poorly implemented. If they got rid of the DRM, it would be great.

But I can understand why it was called Steam - it burns.

Starfox - Krystal

Ah, Krystal. The Starfox character that wasn't meant to be a Starfox character.

This is where I apply a lot of the 'I know best' mentaility to the Starfox franchise. It's strange - normally when I have ideas relating to someone else's property, I'm usually reluctant to get too creative as I'm concerned that any additions I create may not be 'worthy' enough in the eyes of other fans. Who's to say my ideas are good ones? Though I did recently see the film Terminator Genysis, which was utter cack, so surely I can't do a worse job than that.

However I am more inclined to take creative liberties with Starfox and particularly with Krystal. Maybe it's because she wasn't actually created by Nintendo and wasn't designed as a Starfox character in the first place. (if you don't know, Rare were developing a game for the N64 called Dinosaur Planet. The two main characters were foxes called Krystal and Sabre. However for whatever reason, Dinosaur Planet became Starfox Adventures, Fox replaced Sabre and Krystal remained, although in a far more diminished role from what would have been originally intended).

So anyway, the first main change I made was her outfit. I can't say I was sold on her attire from SF Assault onwards. The full suit felt at odds with the type of character I got the impression with from SF Adventures. Her appearance in that game was a bit more tribal and mystical. The full skin-tight suit she donned after that feels as though it goes against her personality and fashion sense. I mean, I've been living in Melbourne for a number of years now, but I still don't have the urge to turn into a hipster with a stupid haircut. Anyway, I certainly wasn't going to go back to the tribal bikini Krystal wore in SF Adventures. That's way too minimalist for a member of the Starfox team. What I'm trying to achieve is something of a middle ground. I think the trick is to keep her clothes looking a bit traditional, but have her equipped with techy gear. She did actually wear a tunic in Dinosaur Planet, but the similarity wasn't intentional. I might give her a jacket like the other Starfox team members wear, but so far I think                                                          this is ok.

The other major change is that I am dropping her telepathic abilities. Nuts to that. I mean, I'm happy for Krystal to be mystical and be capable of some sort of power (channelled through her staff), but telepathy feels like one step too far and out of place in a sci-fi world like Starfox. I was going to say the other reason for getting rid of the telepathy was because she never displayed such abilities in SF Adventures and again, seemed to be an addition given by a different studio and not the original creator, but looking back, there was a scene in SF Adventures where Fox was exiting Moon Mountain pass and heard Krystal calling out from wherever the hell she was. This may have been telepathy, but I think she coughed/spluttered during her plea - something you surely wouldn't do if you were communicating by thought - so maybe this was her talking and the message was relayed through the Krazoa spirit Fox was talking to at the time. But anyway, if I ever get around to making my Starfox animated series, it's a big fat 'no' to telepathy.

Road Rovers - 1000 views

Yay! My Road Rovers animation recently clocked 1000 views on YouTube! Yes I know, 1000 views over a three month period is nothing to brag about, especially when there are videos that can reach over a million in a couple of days. Still, a milestone is a milestone.

Falco

Continuing with drawing the characters from Starfox. I was going to start this post by complaining that Falco is difficult for me to draw and I struggle to get him to look as good as I'd like. However once coloured, it didn't look too bad. But Falco is still a challenge for me regardless.

Anyway, found out some conflicting opinions with Starfox Zero. I watched the Co-Optional Podcast (on YouTube) where they covered this year's E3 and spoke for a bit about SF Zero. There was criticism about the controls. The idea is that you control the vehicles with the control stick, but aim by using the gamepad's gryo functionality, which according to those on the Co-op podcast, felt clunky and awkward. However on the TV series Good Game, they were saying that although the controls felt like they would take some getting used to, overall Starfox Zero would be something the fans may enjoy. I like Good Game's optimism that SF Zero would be good, but I have to agree with the Co-ops negative opinion on the controls. I've played the 3DS version of Starfox 64, which also has the option of using the system's gyro controls to steer the vehicles. I've tried it and it doesn't take long before it becomes awkward and I've often found myself holding the 3DS at a weird angle despite that I'm flying straight. At present it sounds like with SF Zero you HAVE to use the gyro controls, but the Co-Op podcasters were hoping Nintendo relegate the gyro functionality to an option, not as a necessity. I hope they do too. To me the idea of steering with the control stick and aiming with motion controls sounds sort of like the 'pat your head and rub your stomach' clusterfuck.

Anyway, I'm still looking foward to ol' Starfoxy. I hear it's set for release in December so I really do hope Nintendo will use the time to take in feedback and refine the game. Like I've said before, Starfox Zero doesn't have to be a masterpiece, but I still want it to be good.