Holy crap. I believe that the fact that I had several (TWO!) people directly refer to the game mentioned in the previous post is a testament to the power of RSS subscriptions. Nary a blog twitch goes by without the Digital Demons scrabbling forth to do their master’s vile bidding, eh wot?

Whatever. Point is:

• - I’m in a “castle” in France
• - I’m learning about game design, the Ubisoft-way
• - Although I am technically ‘apart’ from my family, I’m still connected to the entire world through these weird wire(less) thingies, and thus can have whatever social contact I do so desire. (Ick! People!)

I gotta hand it to life. It’s failing to suck right now.

[ASIDE: That didn't prevent me from getting my head all wrapped around the grumpy tree when I couldn't convince my laptop to connect right the fuck now. Note to self: relax. /files note in round file.]

Where was I? RIGHT!! GemCraft chapter 0.

A while back (wow, a really long time ago now, actually), Kongregate added badges (as in, “wee don’t need no steenking batches“) to their game. GemCraft Zero has the best one:

This is the Game that Never Ends Badge (hard – 30 points)
Map 78 completed – “Endurance badge” does not even begin to describe this. Go outside. Please. Your family is worried about you. [Best so far: 48]

The “Best so far:” thing is my current progress. But… I should be more forthcoming, I suppose: it’s my current progress… this time.

See, I already beat this goddamn game, on Armor Games (which is the pit from whence this particular spawn, uh, spawned). I paid my goddamn dues. But now, year(s) later, I discover that the itch has not been scratched.

I want that goddamn badge, man.

So, a few weeks ago, I re-embarked on this gem-encrusted journey. It has not, so far, disappointed.

Look, man (or, woman, if you prefer) – it’s the best goddamn tower defense game to ever Flash an Indie, and it’s completely free. It offers more gameplay than many $60 games. If you haven’t played it, and you like blowing up endless waves of mindless creeps that saunter casually along your paved road so that your towers may pick them off at your pleasure, then quit messing around, okay? Okay. Good. Let’s not have this talk again.

(Oh, and friend me on Kongregate while you’re at it. You know who you are. Except, see, I don’t know who you are, so YOU have to friend ME. See how that works?)

I’m level 78. Neener neener neener.

I’ve been fucking around with the site again. Finally. I’m happy with the new look for now – it’s at least functional.

But that’s not what I’m here to tell you about. I’m here to tell you about Mastermind: World Conqueror.

Here’s what happened: I logged onto Kongregate, expecting to play some GemCraft chapter 0 or something. I saw a new game, it had a dark red icon, so I clicked it.

Three hours later, I sort of came to – I had played the entire thing through… twice.

If my opinion on games wasn’t so deeply informed by the need to seem like I know what the fuck I’m talking about on a professional level, I would claim that this is now my favorite game.

This is now my favorite game.

My ambition is to, someday, make a game in this vein. By which I mean, one that is fucking awesome.

It’s a theme for me: other favorite games include Overlord, Overlord II, and Dungeonkeeper. At least I am consistent in my desire to play games in which I lead my swarms of minions to overrun the human world and bring about a new age of darkness.

It says nothing about me! Stop thinking that! I heard you thinking that! It’s just a game!

Honestly, though, clicking the buttons in the final sequence of this game was one of the most satisfying gaming experiences in recent memory. Mu hu. Wah ha. Ha ha HA HA HAH AHAHA HA HAHAAHAAaaaaaa…..

/moan

Have you seen it?

It’s not new – I realize that. Two things:

a) You haven’t seen everything.
b) You might not have seen this.
c) Shut up.

Don’t get all “that’s three things, dickhead” on me. C != 3, that’s merely an oft-used convention.

…

Still not satisfied. Take THIS:

You have most likely gone astray by assuming that the line breaks and the parentheticals above actually indicate the beginning of one thing, and the end of another. That, my friends, is also merely an oft-used convention.

Anhh? Anhhhhhhhhhhhhh?

Yeah. Pwnt.

Anyway, the point I was trying to make is that the Geek Chart(tm), while horribly outdated by this time, is still astoundingly true. There is an echelon, a pecking order, a…

…

(wait for it)

…level… [snicker, snort]

of geekdom, that we are, all of us, passing through. When I ranked myself, I discovered (much to my dismay) that I fell into different levels for different topics. “Fell” is a good word here – I quickly set about discarding my interest in the “lower” geek pursuits, in an attempt to elevate my geek level to a more aloof, condescending one.

Me being who I am, it lasted two weeks and resulted in a total collapse back into the very things I had “stopped doing”, but that’s not the point. The point is:

a) We can become aware of our geek level, and
b) We can game the system.

I fear, though, what will happen when some geek decides to take it on himself to make the chart where “Geek” is one box, and “Rockstar” is another (and “Politician” is another, etc, etc), and we get to see firsthand just where we stand.

“Rising”? We may well be. “High”? I fear for our frail egos.

I’ve been moving this around under the hood, here. One result is the page of Reflections, which contains almost nothing you haven’t already read, but is there to make cohesive to the newcomer the various lunacies I have recorded here.

This is one things that really bugs me about blog systems: they are backwards. When I write, often I’m telling a story, one with a beginning, something like a middle, and then no actual ending. But if you go back and try to examine that writing using the traditional blog approach, for some ridiculous reason, the software makes it trivial for you to fuck up the whole narrative by browsing the entries in reverse order. In fact, browsing them in the sequence they were written in is nearly impossible in most blog systems.

Why is this, why are other people not noticing this, and why has it not been fixed? Personally, I take this as evidence that my opinion on these matters is inherently superior to everyone else in the known blogosphere, thus securing my position among the intellectual elite for all time.

However, it could also mean that there’s something about the way I view blogging (as a personal narrative?) that is out of skew with the way other people view it. I’m sure I’m right, thought.