New Music: The Coming of Fall

 

A little melancholy piano piece I wrote the other day. Perfect soundtrack for a fall day, eh? 

Videogame Review: Indiana Jones and the Great Circle

 

Indiana Jones and the Great Circle is an 2024 action-adventure game designed by Machinehead Games. Its aim is to make the player feel as though he or she is playing through an Indiana Jones movie, and it succeeds rather admirably in that regard. Utilizing a first person perspective with occasional shifts to third person (mostly for platforming), player will sneak through several Fascist-infested locations including the Vatican and Giza. Gameplay is divided into three categories: puzzles, platforming, and stealth-combat. Jones isn't an action hero--he can punch his way out of a jam, but more than one or two enemies, and he's better off fleeing than grabbing a machine gun. The melee system is pretty simple, and although I never really got the hang of how to parry (seems like you have to press it well ahead of when you should) Indie knocked out his share of Nazis during my playthrough. If you grab a gun and use it, every enemy will be alerted, so guns are really a last resort. It's better to flip that weapon around and use it as a Nazi-bashing tool. All sorts of environmental objects can be utilized in combat, from shovels to frying pans to guitars and scrub brushes. Stealth is pretty simple. Just hide out of sight and in darkened areas. Really, the game almost felt like playing a WW2 version of Thief sometimes. One annoying feature though is that Indie's companion Gina will brazenly creep right in front of a Nazi if you're sneaking, but he won't see her like she's a ghost or a figment of Jones's imagination. I'm guessing it was too annoying to have her out the player, so Machinehead Games just said "fuck it" and made her invisible.

Puzzles are never really very hard, which is fine, since you don't want to slow down gameplay too much, and this title is more about the ride than feeling like a genius. One particular puzzle involved a chess-like game where you have to rotate pieces in the same direction sequentially in order to access the next area of a tomb. Platforming involves mantling and using your whip to climb or swing to traverse the multitude of traps and pits that litter ancient tombs. This often necessitates a switch to a third-person perspective, and Indie looks pretty good rendered in the latest version of idTech. The game doesn't quite look as sharp as the latest Unreal Engine 5 titles, but it runs much, much better, and that's with ray-traced global illumination and reflections turned on. On my aging RTX 3080 12 gig, I was able to manage a locked 60 FPS without upscaling at 4k. I did notice copious amounts of pop-in, however, as geometry spontaneously loads into view, especially in the jungle levels.

What really sells this game is that it looks exactly like an Indiana Jones film. The story involves Indiana globe-hopping to keep several ancient artifacts out of the hands of Nazi archeologist Emmerich Voss, who resembles Arnold Toth, the SS officer from Raiders of the Lost Ark. Machinehead Games did the most recent Wolfenstein titles, and they're in their element crafting a WW2-era adventure. Honestly, the cutscenes are a bit long, but they're more satisfying to watch than Indiana Jones and Crystal Skull. Overall, I enjoyed the story and thought it held its own as an Indiana Jones adventure. Troy Baker does an excellent Harrison Ford impression, by the way. Over roughly 40 hours of game time, I never once said "that's not Harrison Ford," while hearing Baker voice Indie.

One note on the screenshots: I played this game mostly on my 4k OLED TV with HDR enabled. Windows doesn't have a good way of taking HDR screenshots, so they take two, one bright and one dark. So some of the screenshots don't look exactly like they did while I was playing.

 

  

Writer's Block: The Jaws of Life

I awoke this morning with an idea for a short story, and this is what I have so far. I think it is time to start working on another compilation of stories and poems. Enjoy the start of The Jaws of Life.

... 

As I stood before those masticating jaws, I suddenly knew that I couldn’t do it.

“I can’t,” I said to the gate agent.

“Excuse me?” he asked. He wore a red jacket with a little mouth pin speared through the lapel.

“I can’t walk inside that mouth, and let that thing eat me.”

“Uhhh,” said the gate agent. His toupee reminded me of a snake trying to swallow an egg.

I looked around for my clothes and saw them in a black garbage bag in the waiting area, so I started walking toward them.

“Wait, what are you doing? He is expecting someone! You’ve been prepared!”

My skin was saturated with butter, and black pepper fell from my graying locks.

“I just can’t,” I said. Part of me wanted to apologize, but I couldn’t. Not with those peg-like teeth and that giant tongue still visible beyond the threshold.

“What am I supposed to say to Him? They’ll make me talk to him, you know! I’ll be the poor sap that has to give an explanation! Look out there! Look at him! Does He look like something you’d want to climb up on a giant escalator and shout inside the ear of? Because that’s my day now, buddy. All thanks to you.”

I looked outside the window and saw Him sitting there, cross-legged on the tarmac, giant hands resting folded in his lap.

“I’m sorry. I can tell them that it isn’t your fault.”

“Of course it’s not! It’s yours! What you can do, buddy, is get back over here and climb past the threshold, and start your journey to the Great Beyond, like every other sixty-year old man! You think you’re the first person to have reservations about climbing inside of a giant mouth? It’s what we do, though, alright? It’s part of the deal we struck with the Gods. It’s the only way to the Great Beyond. You want to see your wife, right? Your parents? All your deceased loved ones? Then stop chickening out and get the fuck over here!”

All while he spoke, his volume had crescendoed from a whisper to a shout. I went over to the bag and put my clothes on, ignoring how the greasy butter made me feel. I knew that part of my hesitation was due to the fact that my system had always resisted the effects of hallucinaginc drugs. Yet who could die this way? Years of propaganda tried to prepare the mind for this gruesome end. However, the sight of that open maw quivering with anticipation filled my mind with more fear than I could even contemplate.

“I’m going home,” I told the gate agent.

He threw up his hands and shook his head, the toupee threatening to come loose from his skull.

“No one will pick you up from here. This is supposed to be a one way ticket. And you have to wear this now. No buts.”

With one quick motion, he slapped a sticker directly on the center of my forehead. I knew what it said.

Heretic.

 

New Music: Drive and Die

 

A sick psycho rocker set to a Cyberpunk 2077 police chase. I came up with the riff weeks ago and used my newly set-up Epiphone Dot to record it. It's got a nice, thick, bassy sound due to the humbuckers and semihollow body. The lyrics are a bit ridiculous, but isn't rock and roll supposed to be about cars and getting laid? Wasn't that what the Beach Boys were singing about? 

Weightlifting At 40; Mullet MadJack; The Value of Game Pass in 2025; Bone Lake

 

Here's a photo of my 40 year old carcass, like some sort of dweeb.

After losing weight last year, I've mostly kept it off. As of this morning, I weigh in at 188.9 lbs, which has been my consistent poundage for the summer. My weightlifting program is a split between powerlifting and bodybuilding, and although my strength numbers have never recovered, I feel as though I'm still doing pretty well, all things considered. Recently, I've deadlifted 410 lbs, bench pressed 220 for 5, and squatted 275 for 5 reps. None of these are particularly impressive lifts and they're far away from my best performances, but let's be honest; at this point, it's about staying in shape while being as strong as you can without hurting yourself. The demands of my job and the pressures of parenthood keep optimal fitness a distance goal. Had I a sedentary job, I could probably lift a little harder. But that's not the situation, and I'm content with my current condition. 

Mullet MadJack is an rogue-like speedrunning first person shooter that I played on Game Pass. It has a very tongue in cheek story about our eponymous protagonist trying to rescue a pop-star princess from the clutches of a Robobillionaire, who has absconded with her in order to prove that God isn't real. As Mullet MadJack, you have ten seconds to kill a robot; otherwise, you'll flatline, because Jack has himself hooked up to a cellphone stream, and the needs of the dopomine-crazed masses require constant stimulation and violence. Is developer Hammer 95 trying to say something about our current internet addiction? Maybe, but the shooting is so good that's it's difficult to concentrate on any message. I picked the starting pistol and upgraded it to level three where I had infinite ammo and didn't have to reload anymore. Time is life, and it's an excellent adrenaline rush to dash from enemy to enemy while the time ticks down. Mullet MadJack scratches the same inch that Neon White did, and I really dig it.

What I really don't dig is that Microsoft just increased the price of Game Pass Ultimate to 30 dollars a month. At the previous price of 20 bucks, Game Pass was a dubious value. For example, I've subscribed for one month, and I just renewed for October at 20 (The price increase doesn't kick in for subscribers till November). I've played over 30 hours of Indiana Jones and The Great Circle, yet I'm seemingly only about halfway through the game. Other than the 16 or 17 hours I've spent with Mullet MadJack, I've only dabbled in Carrion and Hollow Knight: Silksong. My son has played a few games but nothing to completion. So I've essentially paid 40 bucks for Mullet MadJack and half of Indiana Jones. Indiana Jones has been on sale for 55 bucks on Steam several times recently, and seeing how it looks like it might take me two months or more to complete it, how does Game Pass make sense when I could just buy the title on Steam and not have to worry about finishing it before being charged another Andrew Jackson? At 30 bucks, a triple A single player game will have to be finished in a month for any sort of value to be extracted. I'm interested in playing Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, which is currently only on the Ultimate tier of Game Pass. It's been on sale for 41 dollars on Steam recently. If it takes over a month to complete, then I've paid 60 dollars for a 41 dollar game! Sure, I might have time to try other games, but where's the value? It seems like Microsoft has finally realized Game Pass is too expensive, and since they put all their cards in that basket, they're going to gradually kill the service that has kept X Box alive this feeble generation. Oh well. As a PC gamer, I appreciated the value of Game Pass, and my son's X Box Series S is a good entry console, but it seems as though this is the deathblow to the brand. I'm sure console gamers will be excited to pay 700 bucks or more for the Playstation 6 in a couple of years.

Bone Lake (not Boner Lake) is a decent B horror movie. It takes the overbooked Air BnB concept and plays with it a bit. The main characters wear their idiot caps for just long enough, and the violence is suitably gruesome. I liked the cast as well, although I mistook Maddie Hasson for Florence Pugh. It's not the most original flick, but it's a good hour and thirty minutes at the theater. 

   

New Music: The Last Battle

 

A piano-driven instrumental ballad, The Last Battle is built around a Cmajor7 to C-E-F#, which I guess is a C augmented fourth? The progression is closed by an Am6, which is one of my favorite chords, before transitioning to an Em7 to D6 to C-E-F# for the second part of the song. The fast action of Mullet Madjack is a nice contrast to the slow-paced song, but I feel like it might almost be an anime cliche to have a slow ballad over an action sequence. I dunno, I don't watch much anime.