Feedback Loop
Previously on Spectre Collie, I snapped my tether and responded to a critique of games I worked on. The claim was that adventure games are bad at giving feedback to the player, partly because it’s impossible for the game to know what the player’s thinking. I agreed that adventure games are usually lousy at giving…
Good times never seemed so good
For some reason (probably because I was conflating it with Stardust), I didn’t expect Coraline to make a big dent in the box office. I thought it was going to be one of those relatively low-key indie movies where fans go on for years about how ingenious it was and complain that “most Americans” just…
Redemption
Last week, I complained that it was clear “Battlestar Galactica” had done me wrong, because they put out a very good episode that I couldn’t enjoy because there were still just too many problems with the series as a whole. This week’s episode (“Blood on the Scales”) was even better. It started with a space…
There’s so much that we share that it’s time we’re aware
So there’s a good bit o’ hoopla on the internet (at least among those of us who follow this sort of thing) about Disney’s changes to the “it’s a small world” ride at Disneyland. In brief: characters from popular Disney and Pixar movies have been inserted into their “home” countries, bits of Disney theme songs…
Revolting Developments
I was going to make some kind of comment to the effect that the reason the Colonials on “Battlestar Galactica” need Cylon technology so much is to enable all their faster-than-light jumps over sharks. But I thought better of it, partly because “jumping the shark” is such a tired expression now, but also because “twirling…
Body Fuzion
Hey, speaking of old video and VCR effects, here’s one of my favorite things they’ve ever done on “Saturday Night Live,” “Body Fuzion:” The best part (apart from the music) is how Drew Barrymore looks like she can’t deliver a line without cracking up. Also: “Penthels!”
Short-term Nostalgia
A few weeks ago, I was at a party, doing what I usually do at parties — looking for a way to work the Sam & Max games into the conversation. Talk turned to Adobe After Effects and all the cool stuff the kids can do with video editing, and I mentioned the “Behind the…
Fat Man and Little Boy and Jughead
After watching this week’s episode of “Lost” (called “Jughead”), I think I’ve finally figured out the secret of the island: it loves killing unnamed people. If I were a Flight 815 survivor at this point, I’d be going around to everyone who would listen, introducing myself and giving a little bit of my backstory. And…
A Disquiet Follows My Mid-Season Break
Or, “We Never Said They Had a Good Plan.” So last week was the big return of “Battlestar Galactica” (with “Sometimes a Great Notion”) after months of speculation after a huge cliffhanger and the promise that all our questions would be answered. I didn’t really say anything about it at the time, because I was…
SPOILER: Caesar dies
This weekend I finished watching the last episodes of the HBO series “Rome.” It’s been a hard road to the end of the series: it was recommended by a friend on here, but it took me a long time to get into it. And they nearly lost me a few times in season 2, because…
Density Calls
The “Lost” season 5 premiered with a two-parter, “Because You Left,” and “The Lie.” You can tell that they’ve finally mastered the “Lost” formula because they aired two full hours jam-packed with over a dozen characters, eight or nine locations all over the world, multiple flashbacks, a genuinely surprising reveal of a familiar character, multiple…
On the Air
About two months ago, I did the unthinkable and cancelled my satellite TV service. It was both an attempt to save money as well as a social re-engineering project on myself: I’d gotten so dependent on having live TV that it never even occurred to me I could go without it. It was an essential…