Saturday, August 21, 2010

Is PC Gaming dead?



Hi my nerdizzles, sorry about not posting for a while. Life changes etc and being lazy is no excuse for not posting so I am truly sorry.

Anyway, I would like to discuss the current state of PC gaming. For one I love the PC, it has brought me much entertainment and has such versatility that can not be matched. It spawned the internet fandom, is the forefront of gaming technology. You can just do just about anything with it. In the early 2000's is was the most popular gaming platform and in front of any other console on the market in terms of games and technology, so why are people saying it is dying?

Well, I have been involved with computers for a very long time and this sort of thing happens all the time. You had the Amiga and it was one of the best gaming platforms around, then it died to the consoles and eventually to the PC. So is it time for the PC to just give up on its old motherboard and die? certainly not. There is still more PC's out there than consoles either for personal or business, it all depends on how you look at it.

The PC has some of the best developers out there, look at Valve and its Steam platform. It is proving that there is still a market for PC Games and that piracy is not an issue when you can create a quality game that people will buy, also with Valves Steamworks for the PS3 and allowing PC and PS3 players cross platform will be amazing and improve sales on PC and PS3 titles across the board. Valve has some A+ titles coming out that is going to blow the socks off of everyone. We have Portal 2, Half Life Episode 3 and probably some others we dont know about.

Then we come to Blizzard, oh Blizzard how I love thee. They have proven you can still make a bucket full of cash just on the PC alone. I am not just talking about the obvious World Of Warcraft either. Starcraft 2 was the second fastest selling PC game ever (behind its own WoW expansion Wrath of the Lichking) and it continues to sell by the truck load everyday. When cataclysm comes out it will sell and more than likely beat Wotlk in sales.

Yes that is only two developers you might say, but they are but a few out there that is keeping PC gaming alive and with these developers the PC will never die to just being a Business machine it once was. With your consoles, you will have to buy a new model just to keep up. With a PC buy a new graphics card and you are good, or just turn the graphics down a little and it will still run on a machine that is 5 years old. A good graphics card could run you $70, where as a new console will run you $499 on release and even then if you are lucky to get one opening night and wait in a long queue all night for it to release.You will have to buy games that are $60+, PC games with equal or better graphics will be $50+ so $10 cheaper.

So for me, with piracy aside, I feel the PC still has long life and something will come along that will breath new life into it.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Where your dreams meet reality.


Paprika
(Where your dreams meet reality)





In the near future, a revolutionary new psychotherapy treatment called dream therapy has been invented. A device called the "DC Mini" allows the user to view people's dreams, exploring their unconscious thoughts. The head of the team working on this treatment, Doctor Atsuko Chiba, begins using the machine illegally to help psychiatric patients outside the research facility, using her alter-ego "Paprika", a persona she assumes in the dream world. The movie opens with Paprika counseling Detective Konakawa Toshimi, who is plagued by a recurring dream, the incompleteness of which is a great source of personal anxiety for him. This type of counseling session is not officially sanctioned, so Doctor Atsuko Chiba and her associates must be cautious that word does not leak out to the press regarding the nature of the DC Mini and the existence of Paprika. Her closest ally is Doctor Kōsaku Tokita, an obsessively obese child-at-heart genius and the inventor of the DC Mini. Unfortunately, before the government can pass a law authorizing the use of the device, three of the prototypes are stolen. Because of their unfinished nature, the DC Minis can allow anyone to enter another person's dreams, giving the culprit an opportunity to get away with all sorts of malicious deeds. Almost immediately, the chief of the department, Doctor Toratarō Shima, goes on a nonsensical tirade and jumps through a window, nearly killing himself.

Upon examining Shima's dream (which consists of a lively parade of inanimate objects, instrument-playing animals, and various cultural icons), Tokita recognizes his assistant, Kei Himuro, which seems to confirm their suspicion that the theft was an inside job. After two other scientists fall victim to the DC Mini, the Chairman of the company, who was against the project to begin with, bans the use of the device completely. This fails to hinder the crazed parade, which manages to claim Tokita and intrude into Konakawa's dream. Paprika and Shima take matters into their own hands, and find that Himuro is only an empty shell. Tracing the "roots" that controlled him, Paprika confronts the Chairman, who claims that he is in fact the "protector of the dream world", guarding this last haven against the inhumane horrors of reality and technology. He is aided by researcher Doctor Morio Osanai, who agreed to give the Chairman his body and become the Chairman's lackey as long as he retains equal powers over his own dreams. Paprika is eventually captured by the pair after an exhausting chase. Paprika wakes as a butterfly pinned to a table in a room surrounded by pinned butterflies. There, Osanai admits his love for Chiba, and literally peels away Paprika's skin to reveal Chiba underneath. However, he is interrupted by the outraged Chairman who demands that they finish off Chiba; as the two share Osanai's body, they battle for control as they argue over Chiba's fate. Konakawa enters the dream from his own recurring dream, and flees with Chiba back into his. Osanai gives chase through Konakawa's recurring dream, causing Konakawa to realize that his recurring nightmare and anxiety result from his guilt that he never finished the film he was making with a friend. He decides to "finish the film" and take control of the dream by shooting Osanai. The act actually kills Osanai's physical body with a real bullet wound.


Dreams and reality have now merged. The dream parade is running amok in the city, and reality itself is starting to unravel. Shima is nearly killed by a giant Japanese doll, but is saved by Paprika, who has become an entity separate from Chiba thanks to dreams and reality merging. Amidst the chaos, Tokita, in the form of a giant robot, eats Chiba and prepares to do the same for Paprika. The Chairman also returns in the form of a living nightmare, reveals his twisted dreams of omnipotence, and threatens to darken the world with his delusions. A ghostly apparition of Chiba appears and reveals that she has in fact been in love with Tokita this whole time and has simply been repressing these emotions. She comes to terms with her own repressed desires, reconciles herself with that part of her that is Paprika. Paprika returns to Tokita, throwing herself into his body. A baby emerges from the robotic shell and sucks in the wind, aging as she sucks up the Chairman himself, becoming a fully-grown combination of Chiba and Paprika. In this new form, she is able to consume the Chairman's dream form and end the nightmare he created. In the final scene, Chiba sits at Tokita's bedside. Konakawa and Shima leave the two as Chiba puts her hand in Tokita's. As Konakawa and Shima walk down the street, Shima asks if Konakawa ever figured out the meaning to all this. Konakawa, turning to his reflection and seeing the figure of his film friend, realizes that he in fact became the character from their original film: the cop. Konakawa visits Paprika's website and receives a message from Paprika: "Atsuko will change her surname to Tokita... and I suggest watching the movie Dreaming Kids." The film ends as Konakawa purchases a ticket for the movie.


Wow. Simply wow. Satoshi Kon has struck again and captivated my heart with this film. This is another film he can add to his mind f**ck resume. I’d say this movie is right on par with the Ghost in The Shell Franchise due to it’s complexity of technology while, Paprika did not have a lot of cyberpunk in the movie, the two could quite possibly be siblings from different fathers. It only took me one run-through to figure out what was going throughout the entire film. The parade procession can be quite confusing but, I understood it be a Japanese folklore/tradition. I also love when anime film makers include part of their heritage in their films; it shows a little bit of their world and puts a little piece of them in the movie.


Satoshi Kon is talented in all ways of capturing the hearts of the otaku community and quite possibly psychologists. He really hit it on the nail with his psycho-thriller, Perfect Blue. It was a completely ordinary situation and he messes with your brain. He really puts you in the characters shoes. He wants you to feel the same emotions and experiences the characters are going through. This movie might take a few watches for you to get what’s going on but, that’s quite alright because it’s one of those films you can watch over and over, always finding something new.


Overall, I give Paprika a 9/10 and a gold star for creativity, actually requiring us to think with our pea-sized brains.


Definitely worth a watch if you are into Ghost in The Shell.
EDIT: 8/25/10 - I just found out that 2 weeks after I wrote this, Satoshi Kon passed away last Tuesday. It passed away at the age of 47 in his battle with cancer. I offer this post/review/whatever you would like to call it as tribute to this amazing director and animator. Dedicated to him, family, friends and fans.
His ideas and visions will remain encased in his colorful films.