Am I?

RPGs for the computer want to keep me from playing them. Why? Because it is my experience that they wish to cut out, y'know, for a good software crash, right when I'm saving. It happened last week when I reinstalled Dungeon Siege for a run-thru, and now that I'm on Wiz 8 (despite its numerous deficiencies), my computer has decided to pull the same trick. The horrors of Wiz 8 are manyfold: each fight is a life-and-death struggle against terrible odds, and the random level of combat means that tactics play less of a role than do saving and reloading.

So I think Wiz 8 sucks. And everytime I play it, it gets worse. I can't write a review, since pride in my work demands that I play the game at least halfway through, or until the play mechanics and story have revealed themselves to the point where nothing but an incredible drop-off in quality would damage them. So, while I can say that I don't like Wiz 8 and would not recommend it to anyone, I can't write a cogent defense of my dislike in review format. I hate it, but there's not a whole lot I can do about it.

By the way, the above-stated reason is why the game section is largely neglected. It takes a lot of playing to put down a review, and most games I do not like can't move me to. I'll have more soon, mehopes, but I cannot guarantee anything. Anyway, you folks come here mainly for Joe.

New review up, for the movie Wendigo. Lately I have been turning in negative reviews. The problem is clear: you entertainment providers (out there) aren't stepping up to the plate. Get to work.

KC - 2003-04-24 - 19:58:50

But look at this. Just look at it. This goddamn character's name is Elan Sleazabaggano. If that's not the stupidest thing you've ever heard, then you are stupider than George Lucas. And do you really want to be stupider than the man who actually likes this? Ugh.

I've been a little quiet here on the front page, mainly because I've had little to say. Let's all be honest, I'm not that interesting. Maybe a little clever once in a while, but nothing to really listen to regularly. Occasionally I have something to offer, like a mini-review of Postal 2:

Postal 2 is boring. Don't play it.

See? Or how about an anime review: Noir, which I wanted to like, except that it isn't any good. Or a couple of Jubei-chan episode guides, specifically episodes 8 and 9? How's that for content? And who knows, maybe there'll be more later today. And you folks don't even write to see if we're ok. Sniff...

KC - 2003-04-23 - 10:07:07

Last night I dreamt about John Lennon. I was in a crowded theater, waiting for The Beatles to reunite onstage after more than thirty years. John was alive, and the group was finally going to play. I knew I was dreaming. But there they were, necktied and respectably older. They did all the old stuff: solo tunes, group tunes -- the whole shebang. The set was lively, loose and fun. John, in particular, looked great -- optimal John, you could say. And I found it quite characteristic of him to slow the show down in the middle and engage the audience in a banter, which the band funneled into pop bits created on the spot. I loved it. Looking about, I saw kids clapping, young and old, smiling and enjoying themselves. I was a kid, too, and how appropriate, I thought: John always wrote for the inner child. A crazy dream? Yeah, but I loved every second of it...

I don't know if John Lennon was a genius; I don't know if he was a nice guy. But I do know that he was a great singer, and that his music means a lot to a lot of people, myself included.

I can't write about The Beatles. To do so would be silly and redundant -- we all know how great they were. Sgt. Pepper is a marvelous album, and why? It encapsulates everything great about art and music and bullshit. At the same time that it broke free of the conventions of music, it effectively killed rock 'n' roll. That's a big claim for anyone to make, but there you go.

Rock 'n' roll is never just what it is (things rarely are). At its best, it is among the finest, most expressive and direct means of communication I know. And now that it has been historicized to death, we can safely say that rock 'n' roll is first and foremost about pain (with pleasure not too far behind).

This is not to say that rock 'n' roll (never just "rock") cannot work simply as entertainment. Much of its longevity is down to the wily shenanigans of businessmen and art school types (and kids on the street and in the 'burbs, bored out of their minds). But if we are to take rock 'n' roll seriously, and for more than at face value, we mustn't lose sight of its base in the blues, either.

Obviously, we are talking about more than just race here. We are talking about hurt. John was a talent who, like Hitler before him, came out of a bad family situation. Is that too simplistic a thing to say? Probably. But it's hard to deny or put aside all the creativity that came from that pain, and it's hard not to trace such an outgrowth to the way it developed.¹

Whether as something possessed or observed, genius is an elusive property. After all, what do we really know about this bandied word? Well, we know that genius is not a vacuum. That it takes genius to recognize genius, let alone show it. Life, then, is about other people: to get things done, we cannot simply (re-)produce by our own selves -- we have to help each other out with our respective loads. "The daisy chain makes it plain that we're all just yin and yang": There would be no Pet Sounds without Phil Spector, no Citizen Kane without the Germans, and the mad repetitions of "Sister Ray" would not exist were it not for Lou Reed's shame about who he was and what his parents wanted him to be -- and the cost of living is the price of poetry (and all subsequent liberation), etc. In a sense, we're all capable of genius. We just have to eat slop and ask for more when preaching about love and law. We have to sacrifice, and we have to do it together. That's not cynical, and that's not philosophy. That's life.

So John was this and John was that. To pick one over the other is meaningless and fair. Like John, I prefer the 'truth,' and the implication that truth can be bunk and never entirely honest. As long as we' re upfront about it, and true to ourselves, there's nothing wrong with being a dreamer. Because it's rock 'n' roll, and rock 'n' roll is real, the core message of Lennon's music² (if there is one) is that we owe it to ourselves to live life fully, to fill in as much of the canvas as possible, and to just sort of play it.

There comes a point when a magazine like Rolling Stone (or NME, or Spin) will not do. When the mass effort to categorize and rate damns our subjectivity. Exploded Goat never will (nor did it intend to) canonize or somehow measure the merits of people's achievements according to some prescribed standard of excellence.³ KC and I are simply trying to figure out what we like and why, and hopefully who we are. That's all. It could be important, or not -- I don't think it matters. If you like us, great. If you don't, that's great too. We appreciate whatever audience we can get.

In the end, John was only John, I am only Joe, and you are only you. We are the eggmen, and we can only be ourselves.

¹Sometimes I wonder if one's celebrity (or dramatic world-changing) is not the result of that person's bruised ego. John's anger was apparently big enough that the whole world heard it, and still does. All that pain comes busting out, so much that the amplified artist is no longer alone now that the lengths of his isolation have spread to win the hearts of many. That, I think, is a cool way of finding out just how loved each one of us really is.

Though it may be hard to see, all of us have someone who loves us, right?

Anyway, all we can do is be.

²Or, for that matter, Kiss -- the band.

³Most 'critics' fuss when it comes to taste, and I guess that's OK. But that's not the Goat. I'll bet that most of them know nothing about pain, and, consequently, very little about rock 'n' roll. Besides, the best music (or cinema) is always the best criticism of that form.

* * *

In content news, I have three things on the way: two movie reviews and a list-like music feature. So hang on!

JC - 2003-04-20 - 01:22:48

Mainly about video games.

Gamecube (a.k.a. the system with 2 good games a year) will be getting another console RPG soon, Tales Of Symphonia, which will bring the system's RPG game count to two.

No word yet on whether the game will be based entirely on trying to see your PC's panties, (like Xenogears), but look at that shot. Nobody looks older than 8. What Japanese developer could resist?

In even stupider news, I reviewed The Zombies' Odessey & Oracle. And were I asked, I'd review it a second time, or a third. But that's it.

KC - 2003-04-14 - 10:09:55

You can complete the above sentence without my assistance, so I would just as soon you do so without me.

I've taken up the habit of interchanging (one might say metathesizing, if one wished to use the wrong word) "do" and "so" for no decent reason. It is what one does when one spends too much time on one's own. One also develops a sort of intermittent formality that can drop from one's style faster than one can say "crapweasel."

CONTENT!

I've been upgrading the anime episode guide for Jubei-Chan, though I wonder why. My reviews have become more prescriptive of late, and I do not believe that Akitaroh Daichi is really listening to me. So, at best, that means the folks reading them can use them for helping to evaluate their own reactions. Or so they can notice stuff they don't like in a show they thought was OK, thus ruining the experience for everybody. Well, screw you.

Oh, the URLs are here for ep. 6 and here for the subsequent one, cleverly numbered 7.

Also, I've got a new game review for an ancient game you're lucky to find for sale anywhere. It's called Sacrifice. It's okay. Read the review.

KC - 2003-04-10 - 19:55:31

With three big Miyazaki movies coming out next week, I thought it would be the perfect time (actually, next week would be the perfect time, but I'll probably forget what I wanted to say) to go into more detail about why you do not see more anime content here on the Goat.

I. Anime Is Boring

Now, that's an unfair blanket statement, but there is some truth to it. A few years into my anime revival, I am having a hard time finding interest in any commercial artform/genre/whatever that can sustain itself on Cybernetic Maid/Harem shows. Look at this scintillating and wholly convincing graph full of information:

Seriously, folks, this is one homogenized and overtreated archetype/cliche/lazy writer's trope so that he can get some saki earlier in the day.

II. I Am Broke

Just as pressing to the anime community is the fact that, well, I can't afford it anymore. As prices go down, so has my ability to procure funds and make myself societally useful. So, I only purchased 'enemy' when it wasn't nearly as good a deal as it is now. Sigh.

III. I Never Watch It

I have nearly 100 anime DVDs, and, in general, I watch it less than once a month. Usually, I have to force myself to watch - I simply do not have the desire. Mainly, it's because of the next point (and perhaps the only legitimate one I have).

IV. The Established Paradigms Of Anime Are Never Challenged

For me, the primary interest of anime is seeing stories dealt with in a serious manner in an artform (animation) that is often the home of empty-mindedness. So, when anime is used for serious purpose (not to mean stentorious self-seriousness, but rather with the ends to utilize the medium because of its potential), it can be terrific. I point to Lain, Cowboy Bebop, and Escaflowne. These are top-tier shows. The middle-tier, mere workman-like stuff (Trigun, Bubblegum Crisis, and Outlaw Star) have at least decent storytelling techniques.

However, these intelligent uses of the media are few and far between, and with more scrutiny the average anime seems inadequate. In Japanese media, there are tendencies that are seriously deleterious to decent product, and the primary one is lazy writing. Ringu is one of the creepiest movies of recent years, and that is almost entirely despite an empty script, which opens up numerous plot lines that don't make any sense, uses psychic ability as a crutch for bad plotting, and is mainly a mess. That it is an intriguing mess is because of (and this is somewhat typical for Japanese media) a great visual sense. Ringu is scary because it looks scary. Most anime looks better than American animation not because of the number of frames used or the smoothness of action (both of these are inferior to typical American animation), but because of the beautiful sense of design. Uniformity of culture has led to a great refinement of technique. But, just as easily, this refinement often leads to laziness.

Do you love anime? Well, take this test: what was the last show you saw that had a quotable joke? What was the last plot twist that was genuinely surprising? Why is there so much homogenization of content? Are you really intrigued by another taciturn hero who can't connect emotionally, another emotionless blue-haired girl, another robot-warrior chick whose entire life revolves around loving some unlikable nerd¹? Nowadays, the giant robots are alive, but the characters are not. And, for the sake of Mike (Toole?), how many panty shots must we endure before we feel it move from 'novel and cute' to 'sick and boring'?

¹Some argue that the central joke in Tenchi Muyo is that Tenchi, surrounded by hot babes who would like to jump his spongy bones, is perhaps the blandest, emptiest character in the series. I don't buy it, for a few reasons: 1) all the characters in t he show are pretty white-bread; and 2) this would make sense if we had a contrasting character, another male with real personality, so that we can see for ourselves that Tenchi is the wettest of blankets. All else is guesswork².

²Does the mere fact that I'm writing seriously about this at all turn the site into a postmodern sort of exercise of empty self-regard? Does anybody care, and if you do, does it matter that you do? Are these thoughts of interest to anyone, or are we just a niche? How many people am I really talking to? Let yourselves be known. Mail it to me, friends.

KC - 2003-04-07 - 13:08:56

Take a look at this trailer. It's for an upcoming tactical combat game, Silent Storm. It looks like the sort of game a guy like me dreams about: great 3D graphics (see, they're possible!) with a deep sort of game style. And it is TURN-BASED! That means no click-festing, and none of the micromanagement stupidity that plagues RTS games. I can't find screenshots to give you, so enjoy this photo instead:

I stole it from Rate My Kitten, where you can rate people's kittens. It's one of the top kittens.

I also put up a new movie review: Seance On A Wet Afternoon. Not anything like it sounds, but read the review - it's one of my thinking-type pieces, full of BS philosophy on art and stuff.

KC - 2003-04-02 - 12:11:42

Hello! Welcome! New GOATS!!!

That's right, we have a new goat in town, a goat that isn't going to take any crap from you crumb bums!

The new site is more colorful, more streamlined, and has a few more kittens hidden within. In general, it's a good thing (spoken in a Martha Stewart-type voice). So take a look around, and if you happen to stumble upon anything horribly WRONG, drop me an e-mail so I can fix it. Only a few things aren't up yet, so within the next few days everything should be fine, and we should have some new reviews too, just to make our fresh goat a legitimate one.

KC - 2003-04-01 - 10:37:46