Bioshock 2: "They Called It Rapture" - Mark Meltzer

BIOSHOCK 2 SPOILERS FOLLOW:
RANDOM BLABBERING ENSUES AS WELL:
Hello again oh vast emptiness of the net, I've come to bring you new insight on the universe. Actually, I'm here to talk about Bioshock 2 and the impact of it's story. Allow me to preface this post with this: I adore the this game, and the original to no measurable extent. That said Bioshock 2 was an amazing game overall; rendering, gameplay, and audio all came together beautifully.

Viral Marketing:
Noticed I left out the story? Yeah, I'm devoting the rest of this post to that. So first off Mark Meltzer; What an amazing thing to implement the viral marketing into the actual story of the game. Those of you that know me know I am a HUGE fan of Cloverfield mainly because of it's viral marketing.
See: Mark Meltzer (Bioshock Wiki)

Mark Meltzer's Journey:
So while I may have LOVED the story to death I do have my issues with it. Mainly Mark's story and how it was, to be frank, shafted. I felt that Mark could have been a HUGE factor with the games overall progression. He's the anomaly in the situation, a top-sider who most definitely didn't belong. Mark's search for Cindy lead him to Rapture; Arriving during the events of the game almost made it seem like Mark was supposed to shape the story in some way. Mark's fate, which I will leave out of this post, is disappointing to say the least. Mark had quite the potential to be a very important character and while his story was told it could have been more widespread. Mark's story I suppose was for the more hardcore fanbase.

Rapture's Lore and it's place in Bioshock 2:
Moving on now, Sofia Lamb, Andrew Ryan, and Fontaine. These characters, while directly and indirectly, caused a chain of events that eventually caused both the first and second game's stories to unfold. I loved that the writers for Bioshock 2 incorporated the lore of Rapture in such a way that this game felt as if it was an integral part of Rapture's storyline and lore. The writers almost make referring to Rapture give off the same feeling as referring to The Island from LOST. While I don't want to sit here and summarize what happened in the game I felt that with all the work done on Rapture's lore this game was going to be a definitive large scale story; Maybe this is why I felt underwhelmed. Bioshock 2 expanded Rapture's lore nearly ten fold and allowed us as the player to experience and explore areas we had only heard about. For this I <3 you 2K Marin.

Can epic stories be on a small scale:
My biggest gripe is the feeling I got after completing Bioshock 2. As far as story telling goes the writers did an amazing job; but, yet I feel underwhelmed, empty, and thinking “Is that it?.” My biggest gripe with it was the fact that they developed so much of Rapture's lore and the major characters behind it but yet they chose to hone in towards the end and tell only the story behind Eleanor's estranged family. I understand that Eleanor's family are essentially the new Ryan's of Rapture but I still feel as if something more could have been done with the story. Tenenbaum's involvement was too short for her to be justified to be included in the story; However, the sheer fact that she was included made me feel like they were obligated to tell a large scale story. Maybe it's because I am so partial to the original game that I feel the need to have some as epic as it was. Bioshock 2 is epic in it's own right but I still have the odd feeling of more needing to be done; As if my job was incomplete.

Maybe it's just me, don't get me wrong I love the game:
I absolutely LOVE this game and I will continue to do so forever. It left me feeling the same way Watchmen did. The writers told their story and told it well. As a player, however, I felt as if I failed to achieve a true ending to the game. Maybe this was intentional; maybe they wanted me to feel this way to relate to Eleanor. Either way, the game was amazing and I hope you all buy it and enjoy it!

I'll be updating this again soon with more content on my education, life, or whatever. Thanks again!

Night.Do("Work");

Excuse me as I butcher the English language:

Where to begin? Tonight was such a night; I guess it all started with the power outage at Full Sail. So this month I am taking a Networking class that deals how one would create internet/network capable programs.

Using an API called WINSOCK; WINSOCK is close to Unix net coding/base level of other APIs so what we're learning is more the concepts of networking rather than the API itself. I was in lab coding away at my server for a chat program when the teachers let us free to leave. I turn to my friend Tovar Shoaf and ask if he wants to stay and code lab, coincidentally enough the power goes out and I am forced to leave (as my battery is broken and I have no power for my laptop).

So I choose to go home and code some more on my server (secretly plotting to play Bioshock 2 and watch LOST instead), but alas my internet was down! I then came to the conclusion that this was the PERFECT opportunity to code my lab, and just as I was finishing up Tovar called me.

Tovar asked if I would like to come to the gym and work out; we had been discussing this before. I again took this as the PERFECT opportunity to do so and went along.

After a nice work out I come home and start talking with Josh, another one of my classmates, about what my plans for the night were. Amazingly then my internet comes back as if a reward for doing my work like I should have.

Suffice to say, tonight was not only productive but satisfying. Maybe I will keep this trend up???

Seeing as I am nearing final project I suppose I'll update this blog more often. I'll be uploading my past projects soon! So stay tuned!

Quote.Awsome();

“Most believe that what’s done is done; you cannot change fate, no matter how hard you try. And those who challenge what is destined will always be met with disappointment, for fate has a way of charting its own course. But before one surrenders to the hands of destiny, one might consider the power of the human spirit, and the force that lies in one’s own free will”

Vertex Decls :(

//The below code is entirely wrong. Don't use it
//This is an example of how OFF my vertex DECL was.
//Lets say I learned my lesson and learned some SWEET
//STUFF about D3D in the process
D3DVERTEXELEMENT9 decl[] =
{
{0,
0,
D3DDECLTYPE_FLOAT3,
D3DDECLMETHOD_DEFAULT,
D3DDECLUSAGE_POSITION,
0},

{0,
sizeof(D3DXVECTOR3),
D3DDECLTYPE_D3DCOLOR, /*COLORS!? DELICIOUS!*/
D3DDECLMETHOD_DEFAULT,
D3DDECLUSAGE_COLOR,
0},

{0,
sizeof(D3DXVECTOR3)+sizeof(D3DXCOLOR),/*EW*/
D3DDECLTYPE_FLOAT2,
D3DDECLMETHOD_DEFAULT,
D3DDECLUSAGE_TEXCOORD,
0},

{0,
sizeof(D3DXVECTOR3)+sizeof(D3DXCOLOR)+sizeof(D3DXVECTOR2),/*even more EW*/
D3DDECLTYPE_FLOAT3,
D3DDECLMETHOD_DEFAULT,
D3DDECLUSAGE_NORMAL,
0},

D3DDECL_END()
};

Jubilance

I've spent this break thinking and just...cleansing if you will. I have been in a very “troubled” state for a couple of months now and it was really past overdue that I do something about it.

So I spent these days sleeping, cooking, talking to old friends, and watching a little show called how I met your mother. I cannot describe how this combination of things have helped me re tune myself. The sleeping helped re-align my sleep schedule so I wouldn't wake up when the day was over; in fact I woke up at 9 am everyday and it felt amazing.

Cooking helped me work out some of that stress I was feeling (I know this sounds lame but really, it did) and helped me get back into the groove of doing things.

Talking to some of my old friends helped greatly in showing me who I was before things went downhill and really helped me think about what has happened.

How I Met Your Mother reminded me of old friends and situations. I miss the days where I could trust EVERYONE I was close with and didn't have to deal with pesky things in between us (it was the outside factors that took care of that) and it helped me think of all the things we faced and how we came out unscathed. I miss those days and I miss my home in New York.

It seems as if the alone time in between all these things helped me organize everything that has happened and everything I was feeling into a nice compact box to sort with everything else I have dealt with. I can safely say that after this break I am back in working form and I no longer am troubled.

Nope.

Not one bit.

Attached is a video I recorded on the same subject. It will get the same message across just in video format. Thanks for reading!

Software Engineering Day 1 Lab 1 Notes.

Here are the notes for SWE L1

relativePath = \dir1\dir2\somefile.txt

CurrWorkDir = "C:\SomeFolder\"

char [] token = "\\";

fstream mystream;
mystream.open(filename,flags);

flags
std::ios_base::in, out, trunc, binary, app, ate

ate - puts our read and write pointers at the end of the file

seekp - seeks the write pointer
seekg - seeks the read pointer

seekp(num of bytes you want to seek, where you want to seek from);

seekp(0,std::ios_base::beg);
cur
end



// existing ioPakFile;
fstream fileIn;
ioPakFile.seekp(dir offset, std::ios_base::beg);
char buffer[256];
unsigned int nRead;
unsigned int nTotal = 0;

while(fileIn.good())
{
fileIn.read(buffer,256);
nRead = fileIn.gCount();
ioPakFile.write(buffer,nRead);
nTotal += nRead;

}
fileIn.close();
//EVERYTIME YOU MUST CLEAR IT AFTER YOU CLOSE
fileIn.clear();
//YOU MIGHT WANT TO CLEAR BEFORE YOU OPEN AGAIN

Age != Skill;

So I've got a little problem. I'm angry, not because of anything serious but because of how naive I was just over a year ago.

I followed this podcast last year on competitive gaming. I thought these guys were godsend, probably the only people that understood how I felt about video games....and then I learned how to make them.


I see now just how ridiculous these people were and why they always got into arguments.

It's only been one year but I fully understand how to create video games from the ground up.

I've learned the core components of C++, Windows GDI, DirectX, C#, VisualBasic, Java, GDI+, as well as various data structures, compression algorithms, and design patterns for code architecture.

Yet after all this these same people dismissed me in a debate on video games because of my age.


Quite frankly, I'm insulted.

However, I see now that arguing with these people would continue the trend.

An ouroboros if you will.


Whatever, I'm not going to let it get to me.

I know what capabilities I have and what I've learned.

I know how to make a game and understand why things happen. So I'm okay with this.