The End of BT MyDonate

Today is a sad day indeed.  This morning I woke up and check my email and I find a message from BTMyDonate.  Usually this is a happy occasion because it means someone has donated to the charity but this time it was a message telling me that the BTMyDonate service was shutting down at the end of the June

Why is this such a big deal? you might ask.  Well, when the site first started I used a site called JustGiving and everything was fine until I discovered that JustGiving were scalping 10% of donations for their own coffers.  Now I don't hate or fault JustGiving for doing this, they do good things for the various charities and they have to keep their shit running somehow but personally, if someone donated £10 to the charity for a game or towards an incentive, I want that person to know that the ENTIRE £10 went to the Alzheimer's Society and not to me or to anyone else.

Now you can donate until the end of the June, so if you do stumble upon this page or read this article, why not hit that donation button in the top right of the blog page and maybe we could hit a goal on MyDonate page and start a new goal on whatever service I use next!

And yes, of course, just because BT MyDonate is going down doesn't mean that the charity effort dies with it.  I am currently in the process of scoping out new donation services to use in its place.  I'm actually looking for one that not only doesn't take a little money off the top, but also has the ability to donate using PayPal, since that's one thing that people have requested in the stream.  I've even considered talking to the charity directly to see if I can set up a kind of tracker with them but I don't know if I'll get anywhere with that. 

Once again, thanks for the continued support of me and the Alzheimer's Society, it really does mean a lot!  Don't forget to donate and if you can't do that, don't worry, just share some of the content with your friends because more readers/watchers means more potential donations to a good cause!

2019 Vlog: Resident Evil 2 and other stuff

Tau and Friends Play Shovel Knight Part 5

An Outsiders View on Bandersnatch

I just can't seem to escape people talking about this thing.  I've not seen it so I wasn't going to make any comment on it but the way people are ranting and raving like it's the second coming of Jesus Christ I feel like, as someone who enjoys the genre this interactive show is clearly based on, want to throw in my two cents.

As a warning, if you haven't experienced it yet and want to do so completely for yourself then warning for maybe some spoilers. 

So if you somehow haven't heard of Black Mirror, it's a show on Netflix that is written by one of my favorite people ever, Charlie Brooker and is a sort of science fiction anthology show that likes to show a sort of potential dark future of technology.  My personal experience with it is limited to clips and snippets of different episodes but what little I have seen of it seems really good and it is on my list of things to watch fully once I find some time to do so.  Black Mirror Bandersnatch is special because it's sort of a choose your own adventure type deal.  Instead of the episode just playing and you just watching, there are certain points in the show where you must pick an option and the events of the episode will change based on the choices that you make.

Now I've not seen what official publications are saying about it but my Twitter and Facebook are going crazy frothing at the mouth about how cool it is because of its interactivity.  This is all well and good and given the shows pedigree I'm sure it's very good but going crazy over it because it's some kind of "new thing" makes you look just a little bit stupid.

You see, games have been doing this for forever.  For example one of my favorite titles on the Super Nintendo, Kamaitachi no Yoru is essentially the same concept as Bandersnatch but its mainly just text and still images.  It's a pretty famous series in Japan and has a whole bunch of sequels on PS2 and other systems

But Kamaitachi 2 is mainly just text with very limited movement and all the characters are just blue silhouettes, you might say, it's NOTHING like Bandersnatch.  Well I have two points to counter you there, imaginary reader.  First, not only is the interactive aspect exactly the same but Bandersnatch's story flow is actually rather limited and looking at nothing but a flow chart of events, it seems a bit shit

There are A LOT of choices on that chart that mean exactly fuck all of nothing, which isn't really good when you're making an interactive experience like this.  Kamaitachi on the other hand, will not only change events but will even change what kind of story your playing.  The base path for that game is a murder mystery but certain choices might turn it into a zombie survival story, an occult horror story, a raunchy comedy or even a sci fi alien invasion. Sure you can't make EVERY choice wildly change events but Bandersnatchs flow chart seems incredibly limited and easy to work out how to reach each ending.

"But that's not fair! This silly Japanese game is just text! this is TELEVISION!"  Well here come point number two because once again, games have been doing this way before Netflix decided to rip it off

Now I'm not a huge fan of Heavy Rain, I think the writing is a bit shit, another blog post for another day, but this is, once again, essentially the same thing.  Not only do you have to make choices that affect the plot but, because it's being delivered as a game, there's even added interactivity in how the scenes themselves go down.  Take the famous scene where the protagonist must cut off his own finger, if it was Bandersnatch you'd have two choices to cut or not cut and the character would do whatever you pick.  In Heavy Rain you not only decide if he does it or not, but you decide HOW he does it.  Saw? Hot poker? Hammer it off? Are you gonna get drunk before hand to try and dull the pain? It's all up to YOU

Now again, I know I'm being mean but I'm not hating on it really.  I don't have a Netflix account and Bandersnatch has legitimately got me trying to force time in my schedule to sign up and experience it, it looks awesome, but praising it as this "new original thing omg so cool!" is just a bit stupid.  Praise it for it's acting, praise it for its writing, praise it for the originality of the plot if it has it, of course, but do keep in mind that games have been doing this for decades before this came along.

And before any smart ass wants to comment, I know Choose your Own Adventure books did it first but if you google "Bandersnatch" all the news is about how they are being sued for ripping them off so I didn't feel like I needed to talk about it.

Anyway I'm off to sign up for netflix, I'll make a post about what I think of the show itself at a later date

Weekly Vlog January 13th

Tau and Friends Play Shovel Knight Part 4

Gaming Is The Best Platform For Horror

So as you may know, I'm a big fan of the horror genre.  Doesn't matter if it's a horror book, movie, game or whatever, if it's horror I want to at least check it out.  However out of all the mediums that the genre of horror can come in I feel that video gaming is the best way for it to delivered.

That's not to say that the other mediums aren't fit for horror.  A good horror story in the hands of a talented author like Steven King or Koji Suzuki can do a fantastic job of freaking you out.  Koji Suzuki is a particularly good example for this because video games of Ring suck massive ass and the imagery that my head conjured up for the cursed tape based on his descriptions in the novel did a much better job of making me feel uneasy than the movies depiction of it.  There are also TONS of great horror movies, way too many to even attempt to list off.  I have a friend and every time we go drinking together we talk for HOURS about different horror movies each time.

But gaming though, gaming is special.  It takes all these things like these mediums have, the writing, visuals, music etc and makes YOU actively be a part of it.  You're the one that has to fight for survival and brave the nightmares ahead.  You can watch a movie like Friday the 13th where you can just watch someone run away from the murderous killer or you can play a game like Amnesia where YOU have to run away from the monster lurking in the shadows.  If you play something like Silent Hill you can all the excellent parts from the other mediums AND you have the horror compounded by the fact that you are the one that has to navigate your hero though.  You're not just a passive observer in the terror, you're right there experiencing it with the character.

Also because gaming is an interactive medium it can use this to its advantage to further enhance the fear that you feel.  Resident Evil did this early on by turning the games save system against you.  In most games you just save as much as you want but in RE if you didn't have an Ink Ribbon then tough shit, and your first time through you never knew when you were going to get your next spool.  Fatal Frame does it by forcing the player to get right up in the grill of the ghosts that you're fighting.  Not only that, if you want to really succeed at the combat, you have to wait until right before it's going to hit you.  Amnesia did it by making the player freak out if they were to stare at the creature for too long.  It's not like a movie where someone might say "Don't look at that thing you'll go mad" and you just have to sit there going "wow I sure hope he doesn't look at that creature", the responsibility for the characters sanity is entirely on you.

All this said though, I'd much rather have an excellently crafted horror novel or a well made horror movie over a mediocre or shit horror game.  I'd much rather have a copy of Nightmares and Dreamscapes in my hand or The Shining on my TV rather than some shit like The Evil Within or Outlast.  But when a horror game does get it just right it really is unforgettable.