Quick Lesson: Ragdoll Physics

Quick Lesson: Ragdoll Physics

First off, what is a ragdoll? Well, it is a simple sewn together doll that can be tossed about in any fashion. It can be thrown against the wall, at your family, and if you feel like, shoot it into space (if you have that kind of man power). So what does it have to do with physics and the topic of this blog?

Back in the hay day of gaming (lets say before the 1995), lder computers and systems had a harder time animating the dying (unfortunately, I do not have a video. Sad Face :( ) But as technology increased, so did animation. The website, giantbomb.com, states that the ragdoll physics is "generated animations to mimic a freely moving body..." From what I have seen, the body falls to it's death, and then it becomes limp. So if the character of the game approaches the body,it moves freely, like a rag doll.

The earliest game from what I read that implemeted this is Hitman: Codename 47.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ErEGLKKl-jU

Random Game Facts I have found

Random Game Facts

I found these facts lurking about the internet and I thought I would share (just as I learned in kindergarten).

Game Fact #1:

There is a chromosome in the human body called Sonic (the seventh gene).

Game Fact #2:

Square Enix’s last game would have been Final Fantasy. They were not doing well in the eighties with their other games. They decided Final Fantasy would be their last huzzah.

Game Fact #3:

In the original Fallout, when entering a desert like area, a special encounter will occur with a mysterious police box suddenly vanishing (reference to Doctor Who).

Game Fact #4:

In 2010, a game called Pier Solar was released on the Sega Genesis. It was well received, and was given a second distribution run.

Game Fact #5:

There was going to be a CD add on for the Nintendo 64, but it was only released in Japan.

Game Fact #6:

Nintendo and Phillips CD were going to make an add-on for the SNES, but it was scrapped, and the result was a Phillips CD-I console. The company had right to use some of Nintendo’s mascots, which resulted in Mario Hotel and three bad Zelda games (Zelda: Wand of Gamelon, Link: The Faces of Evil, and Zelda’s Adventure).

Game Fact #7:

Japan did not release the original Super Mario Bros. 2 to America. They thought it would be too hard. Instead, they created a different Super Mario Bros. 2 based on the gameplay of Doki Doki Panic

Game Fact #8:

Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask was originally going to be a remixed version of Ocarina of Time for the suppose CD add (see number 5). However, there were some complaints, and one developer Eiji Aonuma proposed to make a new Zelda game in about a year. That game was Majora’s Mask.

Game Fact #9:

The creator of the Nintendo Gameboy was first a janitor at Nintendo headquarters.

Game Fact #10:

Kingdom Hearts 1.5 had to be made from scratch because Square Enix lost all the original data to the first game Kingdom Hearts.

That’s the end. 

The ending goes on and on and on and on and on and (I think we get the point).

What is with all these games with multiple endings?

Remember the days where you rented a game for the weekend (I maybe young, but I do remember those days) and played them out until you saw the ending screen? That one ending screen? ONE? Games are morphing into something different these days.

Now a days, it is common for a game to have multiple endings. I can see maybe two (called the alternate) to maybe three. Four is seriously pushing it. Giving a game more than one makes the replay value go up, and soon you find yourself playing the same story. Some of these games include:

Grand Theft Auto 5

Bioshock

Fallout 3

Heavy Rain

Dishonored

There all good games. Sometimes playing a game lets you find things you did not find the first time around, and see new interactions from the characters.

That’s great, but there are those games. Those games have too many endings. I like choices, but too many choices might make it confusing (or time consuming picking out the right choice you want for the right outcome). For example, Catherine is an Xbox/Playstation game about a man deciding about how to live his life and decide who he loves (that is how I see it anyway). You make choices, and those choices decide what ending you get. There are nine endings.

Katherine (True)

Katherine (Good)

Katherine (Bad)

Catherine (True)

Catherine (Good)

Catherine (Bad)

Freedom (True)

Freedom (Good)

Eight fantastic endings, which means eight times the gameplay. I’m sorry, but after the second or third, the interest just cannot be there. It is a game you play, leave alone to collect dust for a while, and then pick up again later in life. That is one way of seeing all the endings.

Or you use a loophole. Play the game and make the choices where you would get a Katherine, Catherine, or Freedom ending. Save right before the ending, then pick the choices for one of the endings. Then you go back to that save and make the choices for the other endings. Easy as cake.

You could also just watch or read them online. That definitely saves time.

In the end, I just think that games with tons of endings are a little ridiculous. I know it brings a variety to the game, but don’t blast the story with a kajillion (I can make up  numbers if I want to) endings where the cup only moved slightly to the left.

Some horror games and nonhorror games

Halloween has come once again, and it’s time to break out the decorations and the candy that will cause tooth and stomach aches. But it’s also time to scare innocent people (like me). I am one of the easiest people to scare. When I get scared, my brain works double time, and then I cannot sleep.

            Well, I have played my fair share games horror games (and cried myself to so sleep at night). Some of these games did put fear into me and others, while other games did not have that factor. Here are some of the games I consider scary.

Note: This is only an opinion. If it scares me, then its horror.

            Amnesia: The Dark Descent

This game is overplayed these days, but imagine sitting in a dark room playing this game. The setting of this game takes place in a castle where you wake up in one of the rooms and you have no idea how you got there. The objective is to figure out what happened and get out of the castle. Simple enough, right? However, there is something lurking in the darkness, trying to find a way out too. This thing will kill you, and you have no way to defend yourself. The only way to survive is to run or hide. Can you make it out alive? Try while keeping your sanity intact. You never know when the monster is around. Bwhahahahahahah *cough* *cough*

Slender: The Eight Pages/Slender: The Arrival

I feel freaked out just by typing that title. In Slender: The Eight Pages, you roam about a dark field with only a flash light looking for eight pages, but Slender man is on the hunt, and as you collect more pages, he might hunt you more quick until you’re down.  In Slender: The Arrival, the sequel to The Eight Pages, there is more of a variety in the stages. The story is you’re looking for the person from the first game. I consider these horror because there is a spooky atmosphere. You never know when and where the Slender man will show up (or as I like to call him, Uncle Slendie).

Anna

Seriously, this game, this game is unbelievable. I screamed, I literally screamed during the gameplay. Jumped out of seat, and made my cat run like crazy. This game has no monsters to fight. You’re go into a house to find this Anna woman who you cannot stop thinking about. Throughout the journey, you have to solve a series of puzzles in three different rooms. Sometimes during the puzzles, random shadows popped up out of nowhere, and rooms changed into colors of darkness. Amazing atmosphere that kept the brain going around in circles.

I think three is a magical number (don’t you?)

For every horror game, there is one wearing the mask of one that isn’t all that scary (as adorable as a fluffy kitten). Here are some games I don’t consider horror or all that scary.

Another Note: This is also my opinion. If I don’t find it scary, then it is not.

Bioshock

When I first got this game at Target, my mom asked me, “Won’t you get scared like a little baby?” I replied with the sentence, “Geez mom, I can scare myself whenever I want. Get off my back.” Later that day, I proceeded with the game. At first, I honestly thought I would be scared, but as I progressed, I didn’t feel the fear put into me. There were some jump scares and freak out moments, but that trait or even atmosphere that should be there was not. Just another action game with some scary elements. This series is more action adventure, especially with the presentation of Bioshock Infinite.

           

Alice: Madness Returns

Said to myself I was not putting the game on this list, but I saw this game listed on some top horror game websites, which stirred terribly in my gut. This game is not scary (insert those air quotes). It is creepy. The artwork for these characters is strange and somewhat freaky, but there is no way it is scary. I thought American Mcgee’s Alice (the first game) ranks a bit higher than this (look up the last boss). Look there is blood, so it must be scary (oooooo). No. No. No. No. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. (I am irrational)

Let me explain the first game. Alice’s family dies in a fire which she blames herself for. She is stuck in a mental institution, and in order for her to restore her sanity, she must mend her Wonderland. Wonderland though has become distorted over the years, and has taken on an ugly appearance.

In the second game, your free roaming about London transitioning between London and Wonderland. The setting and characters still fashion a distorted world, but not as stongly as the first game.

Anyways, NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Those are the only two I can think of right off the bat (or the big ones I felt weren’t the scary games they think they were). Here is a link about some truly good horror games.

http://n4g.com/news/1252024/top-25-best-survival-horror-games

           

It's about time for that first post!

So I've been having issues in my personal life preventing me from posting (either that or my procrastination) so apoligies for the postings.

I will be attempting either a daily or everyother day type posting schedule.

Anyways...

So my first gaming experience was when I was a wee lad. I cant pick an age or a year (even though it was for sure the 1990s). My mom had sega saturns (she had two for some odd reason), a sega genesis, a NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) a SNES (Super Nintendo Entertainment System), and a couple of other ones. The one I remember is the classic Nintendo 64, and the good old 64 game Banjo Kazooie.

As a youngin, I didn't have the higher order thinking for the games requiring brain power. I just picked a game, messed around in the first two levels, and then move on the barbies (because back then, barbies were cool).

Banjo Kazooie is about Banjo (a bear) and Kazooie (a bird) that must rescue Banjo's sister Tooty (also a bear) from the Evil Witch Gruntilda before shw can suck Tooty's beauty into her (Gruntilda is one UGLY woman). If anyone remembers how Super Mario 64 worked, Banjo Kazooie uses a similar system. There is a hub-world (the area to get to the levels) and the actual levels.

I usually ended up playing the first two levels. I wandered aimlessly around kind of sure what was going on, and then not sure of getting what I needed to movw one. There are two main things to collect in the levels to unlock more of the hub world. Jigsaw pieces (Jiggies) and notes. Jiggies unlocked new levels, and notes opend doors to new parts of the hubworld. 

I could only get enough for the first two levels before dying at almost every turn.

If it wasn't death by oranges thrown at me by a giant monkey, it was death by a shark. I can control my rage for gaming now, but back then, control was a word I could not even spell.

So aimless wandering, not much higher level thinking, and eXtreme gamer's rage might say that I shouldnt play video games that young. But wait, what about the nightmares?

That's right, I have nightmares from video games (still can't play a game at night as a result). There was one scene, ONE SCENE in Banjo Kazooie that led me to the dark places of dreaming (had to sleep with my mother). It was the game over sequence where grunty achieves her goal to be beautiful. But can't these scenes be skipped, April? Nope. The first game over you get, you much watch this scene. I don't know what scared me more. Tooty's ugly apperance or the creepy music at the end. Probably a mixture of both.

I blame my first experience for giving me my creepy dreams, but I also blame it for enhancing my life. I had an older brother, so we would both take turns playing and we really bonded over this. I started to play solo games as I got older, but these games let me enter a world and temporarily be someone else and experience fantasy. To me, my first experience is a personal part of my childhood, and one I will never forget.

So what was your first experience?

Welcome!

Greetings!

From the mind of an awkward quirky nerd,
Welcome to Games! Glorious Games!

I have played video games since my young days (around 4 years old). I grew up around with new styles of games and consoles being thrown at me. With all these games of the old and past, I was inspired to write about the things I learned, and learn from others. This is a fun blog, where others may gather to read and write about the good, the bad, and the ugly of gaming.

Happy gaming!