PSP Go Green?

The buzz on the PSP Go, Sony's new handheld gaming console, is that it's the latest of Sony's many missteps this console generation. Ars Technica finds it to be a poor value compared to the older versions of the PSP, while Destructoid struggles to find the positives.

I've never been interested enough in the PSP to buy one, but I hope that the Go succeeds. It is, to my knowledge, the first gaming system with an expanding library that does not use physical media. I would like to see all video and computer gaming systems abandon physical media in favor of the environmentally better option of digital distribution. Perhaps the PSP should have and could have done this from its first launch in 2005 rather than burden stores and users with a whole new (and eventually failed) physical medium, the Universal Media Disc.

It's unfortunate that the game acquisition process on the PSP Go is apparently cumbersome, that owners of UMD games cannot transfer the games to the Go for free, and that the Go requires its own proprietary cables (another environmental failure). But if I wanted a PSP, I'd probably get the Go. The lack of physical media appeals to me. And there does seem to be significant progress in making the PSP library available online; of the five PSP games I'd consider buying (Disgaea: Afternoon of Darkness, Final Fantasy Tactics: War of the Lions, Jeanne D'Arc, Patapon 2, and Yggdra Union), four are available on the PlayStation Store. That's not bad.

Even if the Go fails, it is notable as a gaming system that requires no cartridges or discs. I hope that Sony is able to improve its digital distribution infrastructure to make the Go more attractive to gamers. Perhaps Sony could have countered some of the criticism by proposing the Go as an environmentally safer handheld system.

Crunchy Katamari

Here's an old article about remarks made by Keita Takahashi, creator of Katamari Damacy. He notes that videogames are a luxury, enjoyed by those untroubled by problems such as poverty and pollution. And if those problems continue to grow, we may all lose that luxury.

His point is well-taken, but it comes from observing the real world beyond games. This blog seeks to learn lessons from the games themselves. So what can be learned from Katamari Damacy?

The object of Katamari Damacy is to fill the night sky with stars, accomplished by rolling up various things on Earth into large balls that are launched into the sky. The game is gleeful about clearing the landscape of animals, people, houses and monuments, rolling them up into balls that eventually become so large that their individual components are insignificant and forgotten. Is the game being nihilistic toward all Earthly stuff? Maybe. Katamai Damacy seems heavily inspired by Japanese monster movies in which great and terrible beasts lay waste to everything they see, smashing mankind's petty achievements into a homogeneous ruin.


I think there's more to the game than mere nihilism, though. Look at how bad things are on Earth even before the Prince begins his ball-rolling journeys. Towns and cities are strewn with out-of-place animals and fruits. Wildlife lives well outside its normal habitat (what are penguins doing at a seaside park?), and there are tacky displays of commercialism everywhere - trophies, marquees, bento boxes, coin-operated arcade games, the works. In rolling all these things up, the Prince is telling people and animals alike that they have forgotten their places in the natural order. He cleanses the landscape of all such detritus (it's fascinating how sane a level looks when it's empty), presents the katamari to the King of all Cosmos, and watches as the King turns it into a star and casts it among the other stars in the sky. The chaos on Earth is thus brought to order. All Earthly things are returned to their source, the stars.


Katamari Damacy is a warning that there is a natural order of things that will be enforced whether we like it or not. If we don't abide by boundaries, we may eventually be bound by forces beyond our control. Either way, from a King's-eye perspective, there's beauty to be found and joy to be had.

On Calling Oneself a Consumer

We're consumers, right? That's just the reality of it. Is there anything inherently wrong with thinking of ourselves as consumers? Maybe there is, if the self-assessment ends there.

Episode 34 of the Humanist Network News podcast features an interview with Gurinder Singh Azad, a humanist activist in India who works as a telemarketer to Americans. At about minute 54 in the podcast, the activist talks about how the rising economic success of call center employees has given them a thirst for material luxuries. The interviewer, Duncan Crary, comments that consumerism is like a drug being exported from America to India.

Mr. Azad disagrees with this, saying that Indians have developed consumerist attitudes on their own. Other countries are not to blame if Indians are increasingly embracing wealth over health.

Mr. Crary then observes: "People refer to themselves, a lot of times, as consumers. It's a very unhealthy thing to refer to oneself as a consumer. Because a consumer has no responsibility to do anything but consume."

On that, the two agree, as do I. When I'm merely a consumer, I only care about whether that new product--whether it's a hamburger, game console, or car--fulfills its function and serves my private needs. I don't think about how that product might be affecting me beyond its intended purpose. I don't think about the costs borne in its manufacture or its disposal.

We should think of ourselves as more than consumers or end-users. Our willingness to buy stuff is the reason stuff exists. We're the effectors. Imagine playing a "god game" sim, moving that hand around to dig the ore, put it in a factory, create products, and move those products to stores. That's the consumer's Hand of God doing the work, changing the landscape and perhaps bringing on disasters.

It's great when companies give us ways to reduce our environmental impact, such as digital distribution and "green" household products. We might find it easy to dismiss these options as having minuscule effect or as mere marketing ploys. But they're a start and, as people who are much more than just consumers, we should take advantage of them.

Pancakes vs. Nuclear Bombs

We had been doing so well with the downloadable content for Fallout 3. Fine, there were glitches and disappointments, but at least the add-ons were downloadable rather than packaged and shipped to retail stores. But then they put the first two add-ons on store shelves, and did the same with the next two. What's more, they're going to release everything again in a Game of the Year retail package in mid-October. I know that making the add-ons available for retail purchase helps those who cannot download the them, but isn't it wasteful and unnecessary to release these intermediate packages between the regular and GOTY editions?



Manufactured, packaged, shipped and sold without good reason, these retail add-on packs are a waste of resources. Of course, I'll be contributing to the problem by purchasing the GOTY edition "just to have it," even though I have the collector's edition and can download the add-ons.



Pancakes are delicious. They can be made in a variety of flavors, or even plain. A stack of pancakes in the morning will makes you happy, satisfied, and ready to take on the day. Nuclear bombs can cause severe burns, hemorrhaging, and death.



Pancakes are easy to make. Even if you make a mistake, it's no big deal. Just clean up and try again! Nuclear bombs are very hard to make. You really need to know what you're doing because if you add too much of this or that ingredient, your day is probably ruined.



Pancakes are inexpensive. Even those of modest means can afford to whip up a batch of pancakes for Sunday brunch. Nuclear bombs are very expensive to buy and then you have to worry about storing them. You might have been able to afford nuclear bombs through financing options once upon a time, but in this economy? Come on.



Pancakes make you popular. If you say, "Look everyone, I have pancakes," people will want to be your friends. That's because everyone loves pancakes. If you say, "Look everyone, I have nuclear bombs," people will get really mad at you. They won't want to be your friends anymore, even if you later serve pancakes.



Pancakes are fun. You can make them in a variety of shapes, like hearts and stars. Kids like that. You can make them thick, thin, or normal. You can eat them one by one or stack them up and dig into them like that. It's even fun to pour syrup on pancakes and watch as it expands in a pool and drips down the side in little rivulets. Nuclear bombs aren't as fun. Pouring syrup on them just makes a sad mess. They don't encourage much creativity and only come in shapes that kids don't like.



I think I've made the case for pancakes pretty well. So instead of buying some nuclear bombs or Fallout 3 retail add-ons this morning, why not enjoy some pancakes?



Pancakes. They're on the plate.

Join the Brutesquad

I mentioned trying to find the unlimited version of Atomic Bonds, the game created by an administrator of the defunct Gone Gold website. I've not been successful in my search, but at least now you can download the 7-day trial instead of emailing me for it.

Download Atomic Bonds trial version

In this case, "7 days" seems to mean you can play it on 7 different days, not that you have 7 consecutive days to play it. For reasonable fun and challenge, I recommend going to the Options screen and choosing Elimination mode with Allow Diagonals, Timer, Difficulty 4, Extra Atoms 4, and Blockers 2. I challenge you to build and clear a molecule of this size:



Important undocumented tip: right-clicking rotates the atom you are about to place.

Here's one of the fun nag screens:



That final "quote" demonstrates Joel Mathis's fascination with Cthulhu. Many other Gone Golders shared this fascination, which I believe is why we're now the Octopus Overlords.

As a bonus, I'm also making available another of Mathis's creations: Gone Gold Brute Squad. I guess you could call the Brutesquad the militant wing of Gone Gold. (Here is a possible explanation of its origin.) Featuring characters designed by Gone Golders (who based the designs on themselves), this turn-based strategy game depicts the Brutesquad's adventures in killing all the idiots that have ever inconvenienced us.



It's simple. It's fun. And it's free. That's right, baby, no trial period here!

Download Gone Gold Brute Squad

Gaming's Citizen Kane Found!

I closed my games as art article with what I thought were the prerequisites for gaming's Citizen Kane. But Jim Sterling of Destructoid has revealed that we've had our Citizen Kane for a long time. It's a terrible game, but I admit that "rise from your grave" correlates nicely with "rosebud."

World of CO2

We talk a lot about how our dependency on oil pollutes the environment and screws up our politics. But has anyone asked how the oil feels? World of Goo would like to know. This wonderful little game, which challenges the player to link little balls of goo together so they can overcome obstacles and find their destiny, touches on the environment, energy, corporatism, and commodity. The story has a light touch, so I don't know what the underlying message is or whether there is one. I think, though, that those goo balls would want us to understand them and not take them for granted.



In addition to whatever moral lesson one can find in it, World of Goo teaches the physics of bridge building. Since the game appeals to kids as much as adults, it may be oblique and simplistic as a physics tutor. But once you watch your half-completed bridge sway desperately under wind shear and its own weight, you'll quickly appreciate the importance of trusses and abutments.



The connected goo balls look at bit like molecular models, reminding me of another game. Way back when Octopus Overlords was Gone Gold, one of the website administrators, Joel Mathis, created a game called Atomic Bonds. This shareware puzzler gives you atoms to join with each other. You earn points and clear the board by forming complete molecules.



Like World of Goo, Atomic Bonds isn't a deeply realistic game and doesn't expect the player to have a scientific background. I'm not even sure what kind of "molecule" I'm trying to make in that screenshot. But one can see the educational potential of the game. What if one level of game had said "make benzene," or only gave you points for making cis instead of trans isomers? How about a power-up that allows you to form double and triple covalent bonds? The organic chemistry teaching possibilities are endless.

(If you'd like to play the 7-day trial of Atomic Bonds, which is the only version I have, please email me. I'll send you the 1.8 MB installer. In the meantime, I'll look into whether the full game can be made available.)

That brings me to environmental issues. With global warming being a hot topic of discussion, I think it's important for everyone on both sides of the debate to understand the science of climate change. Once people see how it works on a molecular level, they can better understand how natural and human activities contribute to it on a global scale. And what better way to teach the science than with a game that combines World of Goo and Atomic Bonds?

Such a game could give you various atoms (all squealing cutely) to link together and molecules to break apart. If you create a chemical reaction that yields a useful product, such as energy, you get points (or money) for it. However, if the chemical reaction also results in a greenhouse gas, that greenhouse gas molecule floats to the top and stays there. (There might already be some greenhouse gas molecules there to represent nature's contribution.) As the game goes on, you inevitably create more and more greenhouse gas molecules, thickening the layer at the top and causing climate change. Adverse environmental effects or regulators would compel you to invest your money in pollution control devices to reduce your impact and continue playing the game.

Plenty of other important chemical phenomena can be explored this way. Let's look at acid rain. You run a power plant that produces useful energy but emits sulfur dioxide. The sulfur dioxide molecules rise in the atmosphere and cause acid formation. If you're lucky, prevailing winds carry the acid far away and make it Somebody Else's Problem. If you're unlucky, the acid might rain down on your plant and damage it!

Green-minded software developers are creating games to educate and inspire us about environmental issues, and I will review some of these games in this blog. But I hope the developers don't miss the opportunity to explore what environmental issues all boil down to: science!