MINI2uMARIO's blog

I am in the process of creating a short, I mean very short hyper-text fiction. It would be awesome if anyone could go through the fiction and give me their feedback. I wanted to do so much more but there just not enough time in the day to do it all. Let me know how the design layout looks, the colors, the narrative. It doesn't matter let me know what you like even better dislike. I pretty sure I can handle the pain. Thanks alot.

Heres the url:

http://plaza.ufl.edu/mlashley

Copy it exactly.

I some ways your distinction between those who read for the pure enjoyment and those (majority) who read because they are told so is quite accurate. I always love to hear students ask the professor in class whether a certain idea or subject taught in class "is going to be on the test," as if it wasn't on the test the student wouldn't bother trying to absorb that idea any further. That's the kind of mentally students have these days. I see it all the time and it's pretty sad.  read more »

I will admit as I entered the conference room this morning I was a little intimated especially because I was one of only ten people there. At one point I was able to use the excuse that I was there for a project, that way I wouldn’t have to explain that I really had no clue what I was doing. Besides that major fact I found that the speakers made some interesting points that I had never contemplated before. I am also willing to admit that some of the things they explained to us went in one ear and out the other. Even if I wanted to grasp what they were saying I couldn’t. My excuse for such ignorance comes because I am considered a novice at best in the realm of what I call “beginners narrative syndrome.”  read more »

I haven’t played much computer adventure games in my lifetime but would conclude that Photopia was enjoyable to experience. I couldn’t figure out what was going on at first but as I got the hang of it I noticed that there was more than one narrative taking place. It would seem that these different stories did not relate to each other at all but impressively at the end the stories come together marvelously.

I didn’t understand the color changing until I looked up the definition of Photopia-“vision in bright light” (dictionary.com). It was then that I understood how the title was complementing the game or even vice versa. There’s probably more to it than that but that was enough for to understand the oddity of the color changing taking place between plots. I found it interesting that after certain vocabulary words definitions were interjected. Honestly, I felt slighted that I was being told what 2nd grade vocabulary terms stood for.  read more »

“If I throw a ball at you, I don’t expect you to drop it and wait until it starts telling stories.” Eskelinen may be right but such a useless comment but he deserves that I pick up the ball and throw it at his retarded self. What was he implying anyways? I suppose he was trying to separate narratology from ludology. After making that comment his credibility points dropped pretty fast.

So his way of defeating the study of narratology is to separate the “colonized” narratology from ludology by “resisting and beating them.” Who are them anyways? It’s quite interesting of the vocabulary he uses because later into his argument he describes duration in gaming as “set time in which the winner is the one who’s in the better position when the set time is up.” It is the exact proposition he used to begin his rant about ludology.  read more »

What the heck is Eliza's problem? I come to her for help but leave with only more problems. It was difficult trying to get my point across to her. Her personality is quite interesting. She gets offended quite easily, doesn't understand half of my questions and continues to remind me why I am asking her for help. Well duh that's what psyhologist do right. Listen to my problems while pretending that I'm not koo-koo for my coa-coa puffs. Well she failed!

At glance, I took the program as a joke but as I got into it I felt that maybe, somehow she good pour out some infinite knowledge of some sort. I stopped looking at her as a simulator and more as a person. I invisioned myself sitting down across from her trying to explain my problems. The difficulty came when she couldn't understand me. I began to get more frustrated and angry. Her credibilty as a psychologist had dimished as I ended my session by thanking her for her time but even then she still didn't know what I was trying to say.

Eliza is the one who needs to be taking her "crazy pills" not me.

In the preface of his book, Art of Computer Game, Crawford suggest that mainstream video games are trival at best. I Agree...to Disagree. He of course makes some important distinctions of art from an artist point of view but he fails to mention art from the eyes of the audience.

I AGREE:

..."that the computer has become a medium for emotional communication."
- The computer has allowed the audience to become part of the art itself instead of just interpreting the art, as it was commonly done prior to the industrialization of computers.

..."more invest of the game equals more emotional value to the audience."  read more »

You might not realize it but its everywhere. Its on the news when you wake up. Its in the alligator that you read. In the text that you study. In the mail that you read. We are engulfed by it. So what is it? TYPOGRAPHY of course. At its very basic essence typography could be describe as the "art of print". According to Bringhurst though, the definition that I gave would bring no justice to typography and be "deliberately misused." "It [typography] takes various forms and goes by various names, including serenity, liveliness, laughter, grace and joy' Bringhurst exclaimed.  read more »

The concept is basic but the fundamental question is crucial in the development of a character. What distinguishes the traits of a Character? Is it the actions of a character that makes them what they are? Or is it the nature of the character that suggest what action the character will take.

A Formalist would say that a trait of a character comes from the actions that is takes. So the character (agent) would be secondary to its actions. Aristotle himself agreed with this theory. In brief, Aristotle distinguishes between character and agent. An agent is one that performs an action and a character is one that "is added later". At minimum the agent must have one trait. For example: If one has committed murder, the character is known as being a murder. Therefore because of his actions (murdering) his characteristic traits have just been established. The trait of a character is constrained by the actions it takes. This is not to say that the opposite could not occur.  read more »

Since students have already made some great comments on Krazy Kat I decided to experiment with the software program FREEMIND.

Breif History of Freemind:

The key concepts behind Freemind go as far back at 1970's by a man named Tony Buzan. In brief, Buzan tried to explain how the mind worked. Metaphorically speaking, our minds do not act like a computer (in which are one directional), but instead the mind is mult-directional. Not only does the mind use words to comprehend information but it also uses pictures, colors, shapes, etc. in order to our gather thoughts. For example: If I were to say the word BANANA out loud...consciously, think of what your mind would do....(go ahead try it).

Your brain doesn't try to spell out the word Banana but subconsciously, your brain would associate a picture with the word banana, the color of the banana, the taste of the banana, etc.. Well, that's what Buzan had described as Mind Mapping. I have made it a point to discuss Mind Mapping because that's what Freemind attempts to do. It is a tool to gather information and place the natural process of what you do with your mind and place it on screen and/or paper. It's an organizational tool.  read more »

Who would of thought that Passage, a game that resembles much of Zelda from back in the early 90's, would teach me about the secret of LIFE. Honestly I didn't get much out of Passage when i first played. I just wanted to beat the game. Duhhhhh!! But after the class discussion it was if I had been opened up to a whole new way of analyzing video games. Hmmmmmm....I wonder what Zelda has taught me about life. Oh i know chop people up with a pimp sword for no reason at all, pick up extra life when your dying in our case more energy drinks Please, and last but not least If you make it that far...you'll end up with a gorgeous Princess..haha...wait....I got the sword and the extra supply of caffeine but where has my Princess gone?

MINI