Games I would like to see finished

So, E3 is going on but for some reason I don't feel like paying much attention to it.
Why? Shooter, shooter, shooter and some other genres. Not much variety in there. I think the best shooter has been made years ago (the Half Life series for singleplayer, Counterstrike for multiplayer) so I'm a bit more interested in other stuff.

Let me make a list of the few games I'm actually waiting for to be finished so I can throw some money at it:

Fract

Fract is an adventure type game, from what I understood after playing their prototype. You walk around in an amazingly nice looking low poly world solving puzzles, getting old machinery working without actually knowing what they do and gradually discovering more of the world.
It will have real-time synthesized music that you'll be able to compose your own music with it (I kinda hope for a built-in recorder) presented in a very nice low poly look.

The art style of this game is enough for me to instantly want to buy and play it, but unfortunately it's still under development (like all the games in this list).

Castle story

We all (should) have heard of a terrifying game called Dwarf Fortress. I would have liked the game and have played it fully if only it had a more accessible interface. Luckily Castle story looks like it will live up to that hope. Sure, the developers don't have that much depth planned, but I'm pretty sure after this game releases someone will make a mod that adds all these functions to it. All the more reasons to wait for this game to be released.

0x10^c

The "New Game From Notch" (aka "oh ex ten to the cth", "Ox ten see",  "Oxy tensee" but actually its "0x" as in "the next number is in hexadecimal" and the "10^c" as in "that's 16¹² in decimal").
A space game, low poly graphics, sandbox, RPG, fully customizable spaceships with fully programmable computers, single and multiplayer connected via the multiverse, duct tape and lots of engineering. These were only a few features Notch has planned for it.
Together with the raging community this will result in piracy, epic space battles, player programmed Operating Systems, custom ships with a lot of references to movies or series, ... just way too much to think of.
The game is just in it's starting phase, meaning Notch barely has the general gameplay mechanics implemented (gravity, lighting, movement) while he often requests for community input. This means we all still can dream of what it will become.

It just recently got in development, so we'll see what becomes of it.

There are some alternatives to this concept like Rodina and Infinity-Universe, but even those are under development...

Minecraft

"Haha!" you may think, "You can't fool me, Minecraft is out for about half a year now!"
Yes, it is, but no it isn't out of development yet. The Mojang team is working hard on getting the game to where they want it to be, Minecraft development is far from done. Although I already threw a bit of money at it.
The effects of a Minecraft out of development are easy creation of mods, easy installing of said mods, optimized gameplay with lots of terrain features, a less raging community (since there won't be huge updates anymore), bug free playtime and much more.
Minecraft still has a bit to go until it's complete, but it already is one of my favorite games ever...

--
(end of list, for now) (hmm, I thought there would be a few more...)

Anyways, I think I talked enough about games, let's play them...

-ThOR

Magic

We all have heard about it somehow, somewhere, mostly in stories (like movies, books and games).
But what is it?

Well, I don't know and I won't tell you that, I'll only tell you what I think it is.

But first I'll have to explain to you guys how I think living beings live.
If you hadn't noticed: this post will be a quite philosophic one.

In my opinion any living being exists out of 3 main components. A soul (the energy), the spirit (the thinking ability) and a body (a "vessel" for the other two). Please note these terms have nothing to do with what a dictionary says they mean (I didn't search it), I use these terms because they are the closest to what I mean when using them.

So the soul contains the energy a being needs to think/live/be, the spirit is a term to describe the thoughts and the consciousness while the body is "simply" the embodiment of the immaterial parts of the being.
Despite the many abilities a being has it's limited to what the it can do. A spirit without a body or soul can't do much more than think (and therefore only "be"), a soul alone would only be energy floating around and a body on itself would fall apart. On the other hand a being without a soul wouldn't have the energy to do something, a being without a spirit either and a being without a body wouldn't exist in this world all together.
So every part needs all the other parts for the being to be functional and every part needs all other parts to be functional. Because of this every part is limited to what all other parts can do. A spirit can't influence anything outside the body, a soul can't "power" anything because of the same restrictions.

But imagine someone who can use his spirit to influence energy. This someone could take energy from other places (or his own body) and use it to influence something else.
This someone (from now on called "the Magician") would firstly be able to control temperature by moving energy away from whatever should be cooled and towards whatever should be warmed/heated/combusted. Yes,in my opinion that should be all it takes to make something burn. It may be a bit of a problem to gather enough energy for something to catch fire but within this frame of reference it's the easiest and most imprecise way because you just "put" a lot of energy in on place or take it away from another.

The next step would be to move something. Since temperature makes atoms move faster or slower the Magician already does this, but now he should apply this energy in such a way that it actually becomes a force that influences his subject. Making a ball roll, making a Rubix Cube solve itself and making things fly are all in this category.

The final step is taking a material and changing it into something else. Why should this be one of the hardest things? Because it involves manipulating energies on a (sub)atomic scale.
To be able to do this kind of stuff the Magician first needs to know what he's doing exactly and until now some parts of quantum physics are by (the real, existing) scientists explained as 'magic' for lack of a better word. (For example electrons. Once you try observing them as particles they'll start behaving like waves. Try observing them as waves they'll start behaving like particles. Why? Magic!)
Once the Magician has figured out what he's doing he has to manipulate energy in such a way it affects that atom just in the way he wants it, which requires some serious focus.
For some decent results he also needs to do this on quite some atoms, so I can imagine real atom Magicians would be very rare.

I say it again: this is just how I think Magic would exists, if it would happen to be real. I don't know if it really does exist, I wouldn't know if it doesn't.

Anyways, I think I wrote enough for now.

See you a next time.

-ThOR

The Other R*****, Part 2

Well, I already made a post on this. Now I have received an answer from Comet:

Well, to put it simply, it's hate speech.
Hate speech that has been diffused throughout the west and has lost some of its impact, but hate speech nonetheless, and that is not lost on those the word targets.

I'll put it like this; if the word nigger became prevalent across the west (again) and was used in common conversation, and lost some of its impact, would you expect black people to not be offended? And people are offended even if you don't use it around them, as you're still promoting the idea that such speech is acceptable.

I remember you said that even if we stop using the word retard, another word will take it's place, but unless we try and stop the use of such language in the first place things are unlikely to get any better, and at the least we can make the use of such language less common. Thank you for changing your name. 

(I did make it a bit more readable, but it's mostly copied out of my inbox).

In the thread where the discussion started he said: "Why won't you call yourself 'TheOtherNiggerFag', see how that turns out."
I won't call myself 'TheOtherNiggerFag' because I have nothing to do with the word Nigger, and I don't identify myself with people with a darker skin. Not that I will avoid them, I have friends that are pretty much "chocolate brown" and I have no problem being seen with them. (Some exceptions are made when it's late at night and I'm walking to my home when a group of 15 of them, dressed as New-Timey Gangsters, stares at me), nor do I relate myself to the group of Fags (Yes, one of my best (male) friends has a boyfriend and I'm completely okay with that. As long as they remain decent in the presence of other people (as ANY couple should do)).

I mostly relate to the group of Retards, acting 'stupid' (in the eyes of other people) for no particular reason, being happy with the smallest thing they receive, ...
If I could I'd like to share some of my IQ with my mentally retarded nephew so he could see the world a bit more like we do (but on the other hand I don't think he'll be as happy as he is now with that gift...).
I care about anyone who has a disadvantage in any way, as I know they'll be pretty much picked on by the first bully they meet (children can be evil to each other once they find a weak spot).

In any way I'll keep my name as 'TheOtherRetard' unless the website's Admins say otherwise, next will be 'ThOR' (with that exact capitalization) and if that's not available I'll figure out something different.

I think that's all I have to say on this theme...

Thank you for reading.

-ThOR

Lecture - Literature

Let me start off by saying I haven't read a lot.
Very probably did I read more than most people of my age, but I still could've read more. I remember sitting on the bus/tram/train and wishing I had a book to read. It wouldn't matter what book, just anything to read.
Yes, I could spend that time listening to music, but my iPod is dying (barely a few hours battery life in normal (20°C) temperatures, "Back/REW" and "Play" button are refusing to work (thank you Center Button for not giving up on me), so I expect I'll need to replace it with something else by next year) and I often forget to stop by the library to pick up a book.
But thanks to friends I sometimes have something to read...

Anyways, back on topic.

Recently (today, that is) I finished the "Hunger Games" book. The first one that is (No, I haven't watched the movie, maybe I'll download it next year... or maybe I could convince someone to go to the cinema with me...) and I'm hoping my brother will find the sequels fast enough so I can finish the story.

But I don't like the writing style.

Don't get me wrong, it's a page turner once you get into the story (read it from begin to end in less than 2 days) but there aren't any passages where you can feel the translator had a hard time translating something that is very specific for the English language.
Yes, I read a Dutch translation, but I don't expect reading it in English would improve the story in any manner.

Let me bring in another story for comparison. One that many know, that isn't too complicated and that also has a movie coming up. (Sheesh, did I get distracted for a few hours while trying to copy that link...) (To those hesitant to click the link: it's "The Hobbit")
I've read the story in both Dutch and English and believe me when I say that the latter is way more enjoyable. The first time I read it I needed a dictionary to figure out some words (oh, the synonyms for walking) but I liked it all the more.

If we go even further down the way of literature we find Gormenghast.
I've read it a few years back, but I must say I'm still impressed by what the writer (Mervyn Peake) did with it.
It doesn't have a clear theme in which it's written. At first sight you may say it's "Fantasy"... But once you're reading you notice there isn't any magic happening, there are no characters that aren't human by definition (although lots of them are brute caricatures of humans) and everything seems plausible, since it may happen if some castle would've grown from the roman age and slowly progressing in size, building styles, functionality and weirdness to finally end up like the humongous castle that's described.
"Fiction" covers too much of what the book actually is and "Historical Fiction" isn't correct as there is absolutely no attachment to our existing world. In my opinion "Surreal" is the most fitting description.
Let me give you a quote from the book (found on the Wiki):

Mr. Flay appeared to clutter up the doorway as he stood revealed, his arms folded.... It did not look as though such a bony face as this could give normal utterance, but rather that instead of sounds, something more brittle, more ancient, something drier would emerge, something more in the nature of a splinter or a fragment of stone. Nevertheless, the harsh lips parted. "It's me," he said, and took a step forward, his joints cracking as he did so. His passage across a room -- in fact his passage through life -- was accomplished by these cracking sounds, one per step, which might be likened to the breaking of dry twigs.

Here is described one of my favorite characters is the series.
I bet none of you know anyone like this Mr. Flay, now try to imagine him... May be kinda hard, lacking a lot more info on it, but I imagine most of the characters as cartoon characters instead of trying to compare them to real people.

But the book provides more than just strange characters. If you plan on reading it be prepared for pages filled with descriptions of a river running through a landscape, "hopping" from character to character while you're reading (you start with one, he meets someone, you hop on to that character, another encounter, another hop, and so on...), passages of "Internal monologue", changes in telling perspective, ... A real feast for people enjoying the art of writing.

And here's the big thing I miss in a lot of stories. The art of writing the story. Not just telling it in a way so we know what's happening, but using the language you're writing in to the fullest to tell the story.
Sure, the Hunger Games lured me in because of the story, but I miss the joy of language. The playing with sentences to make some parts stand out, the vocabulary enrichment I kinda expect every book to be...

But hey. I'm not going to ignore books because of this, I just wanted to point out some things I would like to see more in modern literature.

I'm not saying my parts here are pure literature... I don't really think about the sentences, I just write whatever comes into mind, as some may have noticed...

But I'd rather read something more complicated (Maybe I'll once try to read Finnegans wake, but not very soon) instead of another "high fantasy" story where Elf and Dwarf and Man fight with/against each other and Light tries to defeat the Dark...

Anyways, I said enough on this topic for now.
If anyone has propositions for books to read, tell me in the comments.

Thank you for reading.

-ThOR

Games

Jah, sure, it couldn't take long before even I'd react on the latest news event.

Wondering what I'm talking about?
Google "Breivik video games" and read the most recent entries.

I just opened the first one, read through it and i the end it adds 5 examples how some murderers (including the most recent, Breivik himself) were inspired by movies/books/games to commit some murders.
Note, there are only 5 listed, 5 cases between 1974 and now.
Sure, these aren't the only 5, but it's still not terribly much compared to the total amount of murders committed...

But now they are all blaming it on video games, saying Breivik used them to prepare for the final "attack" he planned. All those articles against video games, but none noting Breivik himself never said such a thing. He for example played WoW for more than 16 hours a day over a year to "take a sabbatical" (his words), to not be preoccupied planning all that stuff, to do something he'd love to do before he'd die (as he planned his actions to be suicidal).
Not many sources mention his extensive planning BEFORE playing these games, his many hours in a shooting range, perfecting his aim, his claims to be a member of a "anti-Jihad crusader-organization" and his legal/illegal acquirement of his weapons. Nope, it's just video games.

No, I don't want to defend his cause in any way. What he did is horrible and he should be trialed for what he did. But don't blame it on video games. As realistic some first-person-shooters claim to be, they still don't prepare you in any way on the real deal. You can't revive after you die in real life, you can't heal instantly from a bullet in your arm by picking up some health-pack, you can't run around with a rifle, waving it around like it's made of plastic and then kill someone (accurately) seconds after rolling into position by simply playing video games.

You seriously CAN'T.

I remember my first time I fired a bullet.
Yes, it was in an ex-soviet state.
And yes, it was a AK-47 or Kalashnikov.
And no, after all those hours playing Counter Strike 1.6 (I can't link too much, I never exactly know who my audience is...) I still wasn't prepared on anything that thing did.

First off, that thing's HEAVY. You try holding a 5 kg (11 lb) bag of potatoes with arms stretched and imagine shooting stuff with it... take a break before your arms fall off.
The kickback is also a surprise. It's those same 5 kg stomping you in the shoulder every time you pull that trigger. After the first bullet I already had a bruise and I was deaf for the next few minutes. Because that small detail game designers tend to leave out: The bang is so loud you can only understand your own words after 5 minutes. To understand others it takes even longer...
No movie, no game ever actually tells you this, it's all soldiers that storm into battle, screaming to their brothers in arms who understand them from 2 meters away, waving their guns without real fatigue...

As far as I remember I only saw one movie that kinda did show this correctly. And it was some strange French movie we had to watch with school for some reason...

So no, nothing in popular media can prepare anyone on a real battle, only hard training can.
But as long as no one talks about it they all tend to forget about this and blame only video games.

As a final thing I would like to link a more gamer friendly article.
Sure, it starts with the usual panic-inducing headline, with some more panic blah that should accompany these articles, but halfway the writer quotes gamers (more than 30 year-old-gamers) that express their concerns on the current situation.

-ThOR

PS: I found a funny quote in the last linked article:

Breivik said a holographic aiming device used in Modern Warfare helped him develop skills with a real gun.

...
Now think about it.
How could a virtual "holographic aiming device" possibly help someone aiming a real gun?

PPS: Oh, hey, turns out there's more articles up now. Go read this analysis posted yesterday (currently second result when googling...). I started writing this yesterday, there were more "doom is upon us because video games" articles then, so the current google search may not be all that correct...

PPPS: Thank you for reading.

The Other R*****

Dear readers.

A few days back I happened to be in the center of a heated discussion concerning my name.
Quite unsettling for me as it's the very first discussion on the internet with me in the center of it (mostly I'm what some call a lurker, I don't really say much)

I had registered on the forum of Notch's new game (0x10^c, may you wonder) and I posted a small introductory post saying hi and stating who I am...

First reply is made by someone named Comet:

Nice post, but please let me know if your name is intended to be funny or an attack at people who think it is? If it's the prior, change your name. It's offensive, and even though i take it you don't mean it, you should know better.

Until now I still don't actually know what the guy meant, I just sent him a PM as a request for more information on his arguments.

And why could I use my name for about 3 years without anyone pointing this out to me?
A short list to all my identities as TheOtherRetard or alike on the internet:

• CounterStrike (and Steam in general) 
• LeagueOfLegends 
• O-Game 
• Minecraft
• CastleStoryOnline
• Twitter
• Youtube
• here
• Wikis
• Weekly Pickaxe
• ... (This is just what I could remember from the top of my head, if you Google me you may find even more...)

So yeah, on all those communities, on all those websites, after my 400+ posts on the Minecraft forum only 2 have openly opposed and demanded me to change my name because of possible offensiveness...

First of all: I don't use the word Retard as an offensive word. In my opinion it's used for someone who acts stupid. And I do lots of stupid stuff...

Let me tell you a bit more about myself.
I know what it's like to be called names. I was that one kid that liked to play alone, I was that kid that was the first one of my class to wear glasses (at the age of 7), I was that kid that didn't do or say much during lessons, but still could score above average on most tests...
Per definition I was the one they (the other kids, you know which ones) picked on. Well, me and the fat kid. And when they were picking on the fat kid I never participated, just because it wasn't as fun as they made it look like...

Anyways, this made me have quite an aversion from calling names cursing and stuff, which I still have (if you hear/read me cursing you know I'm agitated...). So when i use the word Retard I mostly just refer to myself...

Oh, I didn't tell about the creation of TheOtherRetard.
It dates a few years back, to when I was playing Counterstrike 1.6 with my (younger) brother. One day we had the idea to name ourselves alike and have some kind of a "clan" feeling. After some suggestions we stopped on "Retard", since we never took ourselves quite seriously and did a lot of stupid stuff while playing the game...
This discussion was followed by a few days of me being away from the computer and when I came back my brother had taken "The_Retard". I quickly settled for "The_Other_Retard" and we went on shooting...

And I liked being the Other Retard. No-one expects much from me, so when I screw up they can say "What a retard!" ending up with me smiling.

One letter too long to fit on a sign...

Ever since that I kept on using the name for pretty much every other game I played, just to have something of a continuity. After the realization that my name was 1 letter too long to fit on a Minecraft sign I dropped the underscores in other games and went on playing.

It never occurred to me people could consider my name as an insult as I clearly name myself a retard, and no one else.

After all that time I'm proud of that name, I'm identifying myself with it and I don't plan on dropping the name because 2 people (of the millions on the internet) want me to change it.

I ended up changing my name as they added "Slurs and insults" to the Forum Name Rules, so I'm now registered as "ThOR"...
I won't fight this decision, there's been enough discussion on it. I'll still use "TheOtherRetard" as a first choice, "ThOR" if Retard is considered insulting and if that's taken I'll think of something similar.

Anyways, thank you for having read all this. If you have any comments, please post them, I'll respond on them as soon as possible.

-ThOR

PS: The story hasn't ended yet, there is a Part 2 of this post.