Mssv

I always found it a little odd how Bill Murray seemed to be so dismissive of Ghostbusters, and more recently, Groundhog Day. When I watched them properly a few years ago (i.e. when I was an adult and could understand all the jokes), I wondered what his problem was. As I saw some of his [...]

…or not.
There’s an interesting article on the New York Times about the recent blossoming of internet comedy, partly thanks to the Writer’s Guild of America strike (will it continue after it ends, I wonder?). In it, there’s an interesting quote:
“I love it when people say, ‘I want to make a viral video,’ because it’s like [...]

At GDC this year, I remember hearing some writers talk about the sorry state of story and dialogue in action/adventure games. One of the promising games that they looked forward to, though, was Mass Effect – apparently it would have a brand new conversation system.
Over the months, details emerged. In effect, the game would allow [...]

One of the most innovative games that’s come out of this year’s E3 is Echochrome for the Playstation; basically, if M. C. Escher could’ve made a computer game, this is what it would look like. I have some questions about the control scheme, difficulty level and gameplay (e.g. does the guy keep on walking all [...]

Weather
In a book about weather (called ‘Weather’) that I’m reading, there’s a fact that blithely states:
Driest location: The Atacama Desert in Chile has virtually no rainfall (0.08mm annually), except for a passing shower several times a century.
Not several times a year. Several times a century. What impresses me about this is not the fact that [...]

That’s what this wonderfully incisive Movie Preview Review says, anyway:

I’m going to see the movie – for the robots.

A couple of months ago, I went to see Yann Tiersen play at The Scala in London. Mr Tiersen is, of course, the person behind the tinkling, cheery and immensely popular music to Amelie and Goodbye Lenin.
Shortly before the gig, I discovered that he probably wouldn’t be playing just Amelie-style music, but instead he’d be [...]

Much as I hate to perpetuate memes like this, the whole saga of YouTube’s lonelygirl15 has just hit Metafilter. Basically, someone has posted a bunch of video diaries to YouTube purporting to be a young homeschooled girl with ultra-religious parents. She’s having drama with a boy, and she appears to be involved in some satanic [...]

Sonic boom video – a jet fighter causes a particularly impressive shockwave during a sonic boom (thanks Charlie!)

Doug Chiang Studio – home of the Robota art/book/film story. There’s an extremely well done teaser video (Teaser II) for the project there.